Napoleon's Plan
by chris dee
Summary: Cat—Tale 43: Ra's al Ghul has a plan, a simple twopart plan: First we show up. Then we see what happens. What could go wrong?
1. Dragons

**Napoleon's Plan**  
_Chapter 1: Dragons_

* * *

Ra's al Ghul's life was nearing its end. He knew this. He had declared its final day. "Ubu," he had ordered, "Apprise the Pit-Stirrers that the Demon's Head shall present himself for the _Mergulho al Ghul_ at the eve of the next moon."

The _Mergulho al Ghul, _literally the "dipping of the Demon" ritual, would end his present life, which was receding rapidly on its own. The twelve gray hairs he counted the day he gave the order had multiplied into hundreds, which were now interspersed with an alarming number of white. His beard had grown thin and brittle. His body felt hollow and heavy. And his digestion groaned from the rich dishes he had been able to enjoy only days before, forcing him to a bland diet of tea and toast which was fully as depressing as the gray hairs and white beard. But by immersing himself in the fiery depths of the Lazarus Pit, Ra's al Ghul would be reborn into a new life, as he had been for centuries, as he would be for centuries more… he hoped.

The troubling fact was that the effects of the pit seemed to wane faster after each immersion. At first, Ra's attributed this to faulty construction, for a Lazarus Pit could not be placed just anywhere: there were precise points on the earth's surface, where the ley lines intersected _and_ which were placed favorably under Thuban, the Polar star in the Greek constellation Draco. It was easy enough to make some small errors in the calculation; mankind's rape of the land and poisoning of the atmosphere may well have disrupted the life-flow through the ley lines or distorted the true position of the stars. Once. Twice even. But not dip after dip, pit after pit. Ra's could only assume that there was a limit to the life-giving magicks any one being could absorb. He had extended his life for over a millennium, and he meant to continue. But eventually…

Talia was no fit heir. Weak, irresolute, and a woman, she could never assume the role of Ra's al Ghul and lead his empire—and if she did, she could never hold true to his great goal and unite the world under DEMON rule. The Detective would sway her in a year at most, and she would set about deliberately dismantling his empire, assuming she did not destroy it accidentally with her incompetence.

Weak, irresolute, and a woman. No, he needed a true heir. He needed the Detective. There was a man such as this modern age seldom bred, a man who committed himself, body and soul to a vision—a flawed vision, but the goal did not interest Ra's so much as the dedication to achieving it. Yes, the Detective was a superior being, plain and simple. No one was better suited to sire an heir of his blood fit to lead DEMON into a golden age of global rule.

Ra's sighed. He must put such worldly thoughts from his mind to prepare for the coming ceremony.

* * *

Giovanni D'Annunzio looked over the new arrival at his podium with the experienced hauteur of a Gotham City snob. The man was impeccably dressed and possessed an air of confident self-assurance that marked one born to privilege – yet there was something vaguely familiar about the man's features, markedly handsome features at that, which hinted at _celebrity_. If he were a moviestar or a news anchor, that would knock him down a tier in Giovanni's complex hierarchy. There was no question of the man getting a table, nor even of his waiting for one, but Giovanni had yet to decide if it would be a first level table or second.

"Your name, Signore?" Giovanni asked with a bored drawl.

"Dent, Harvey Dent. A party of _two_, the reservation is under Wayne."

Giovanni's face transformed at the magical name.

"Ah yes, Mr. Wayne's guest. Welcome to D'Annunzio's, Signore Dent! Here I assumed he would be lunching with _la bella gatta, _Miss Selina that is. Signore Wayne, he has not yet arrived, but his table will be ready in _due minuti_, two minutes, I promise. If you like to wait in the bar, I come get you."

"As it's only two minutes, I'm sure I can wait," Harvey Dent observed dryly. The frequency with which the number two came up in casual conversation was the most poignant irony he'd observed since that curious Jason Blood fellow had banished Two-Face from his life.

Giovanni was as good as his word, and in two minutes time he escorted Harvey into the large dining room, to what was clearly the very best table. Harvey shrewdly surmised that being led in by the proprietor himself was a rare honor, one Giovanni bestowed only on the very few, like "Signore Wayne's guests."

As they approached the table, Harvey saw that there was already a chilled martini sitting on the table before the chair to which he was being pointed. He couldn't suppress a chuckle as he looked it over: Selina's martini—garnished with a live orchid no less.

"Evidently they didn't get the word in the bar about _la bella gatta_," he noted, handing the glass gingerly to Giovanni. "Perhaps you'll take this away and bring me your best single malt Scotch."

"Of course," Giovanni said pleasantly, then he tilted the glass temptingly. "Signore is certain he would not like to try the Paradiso martini?"

Harvey looked at the drink's garnish, the light purple-white petals pocked with tiny red and yellow dots, and an unfathomable look came into his eye. His left eye squinted slightly as the left side of his mouth curled into a faint, fleeting smile.

"Eh, no," he said at last. "Flowers in the vicinity of my lips, this is not a good thing. Just a scotch please—_single_ malt."

Giovanni nodded and left.

* * *

Ra's knelt at the altar of Huang-Ti, the "Yellow Emperor," said to have been carried away body and soul at the end of his life by a Dragon Spirit in reward for having ruled justly.

Stubborn Western ignorance would never understand the noble magic of dragons. Ra's still remembered bitterly his efforts to educate Richard Wagner on the subject. He was _grooming_ Wagner, sensing a power in the German composer that could inspire armies to conquer the Earth! That didn't work out, of course. Nazis. That's what Ra's got for his trouble. All those years following the composer from Dresden to Saxon to Paris to Zürich, forced always to meet in those ale houses and drink that revolting Leipzig beer, priming the man with the most rousing ancient legends. And what did Wagner do with it? Fafner! A sorry excuse for a dragon who did nothing more than guard a hoard of treasure—until _the hero_ lured him from his home, hid like a coward under a rock, and stabbed him in the belly. What kind of inspiration was that? What army could possibly rally around… What a waste. More wasted years.

Ra's al Ghul sighed. He was meant to be preparing himself for the ritual. He had to clear his mind of these painful recollections. All thought was distraction. He must ready himself to embrace oblivion.

* * *

As Catwoman, Selina was accustomed to flitting about houses like Wayne Manor, silent and invisible to the occupants. As a professional, she had no difficulty eluding someone like Alfred; it was no different—in fact, it was far easier—than evading security guards.

Except that she rather enjoyed slipping past those hopeless dolts the museums hired from Pinkertons or Foster & Forsythe. Whereas hiding in the little alcove in the library until Alfred had passed with his tea tray, that gave her a disquieting pang.

But what could she do? He was being impossible. She had nothing more than a simple bruise on her cheek from the museum skirmish with Catman. It didn't even develop into a full black eye. It was a bash on her cheek, a little swelling and a little discoloration that was nearly healed already. And yet Alfred was fussing over it as if nobody in the Bat-family had ever come home with a bump or a scratch. So far, he had iced it, salved it, disinfected it, iced it _again_, and asked to check it no fewer than four times a day. Feline pride rebelled!

Not to mention, each and every examination was the occasion for another little "chat" about her moving out of the manor that night. It was _one night_! She and Bruce had decided, given the Bat and Cat history attached to the Gotham Museum of Modern Art, that it really would be too difficult going to the reopening gala as a couple. Just dressing for it in the same room seemed impossibly awkward. It would be so much better if she could go on her own, just as she would have if nothing ever changed between her and Batman. So she had moved out to the penthouse for that one single night, taking her evening gown and her jewels, her makeup—and of course her cats. For Selina, no dwelling could feel like home without Whiskers and Nutmeg. And it was that detail which seems to have outraged Alfred beyond any rational understanding.

Bruce admitted that Alfred had heard a good number of denials and half-truths over the years on the subject to of Batman and Catwoman. And he apparently took Bruce's _perfectly accurate and dispassionate_ explanation of the one night arrangement to be the biggest Bat-whopper so far. But Selina, happy innocent, had assumed that when she returned home the next day, all would be set right: she was back, the cats were back, and life at the manor would go on as before.

This, evidently, was "Feline logic," Bruce's little term for whatever perfectly simple thing he didn't understand. Except in this case, it was Alfred who viewed the mutually acceptable one-night separation as some kind of monstrous outrage.

The way he had lectured her as he iced her cheek (It really _was_ a Bat-lecture, there was no question now where Bruce had acquired certain aspects of that insufferable rooftop "Battitude"), it… it felt unbelievably like the Watchtower. When he refused to admit she'd _saved_ the whole bloody Justice League when they bungled themselves into such a sorry state against Prometheus, and all he would keep repeating was how she'd only snuck in to steal the Storm Opals—which she put back anyway.

She _had_ come back to the manor, it _was_ just one night at the penthouse, it was only a bit of fun, lord knows she needed a bit of fun after all the—

"Ah, there you are, Miss. I was just coming to look for you. It is well past time to apply a fresh ice pack."

Selina closed her eyes and flourished her clawless fingertips, summoning patience. It really was unfair that anyone possess so much Battitude outside of a rooftop where she could claw off a piece and feed it to him.

* * *

Ubu stood alone in a dark subterranean alcove. To his right was the antechamber in which Ra's al Ghul was purifying his flesh in preparation for the ritual of the Lazarus Pit; to his left was the narrow stone staircase which led to the Pit itself. The chant of the Pit-Stirrers echoed beautifully throughout the caverns. This was the first _Mergulho al Ghul_ since the man born Corcea Porumbescu, son of Joseph Porumbescu, was called as Ubu. He clutched the vial in his hands and prayed he would be equal to the great task before him.

The Pit-Stirrers had begun to chant as soon as Ubu sent word that the Demon's Head had entered the antechamber. They sang of the dragon that churns the whirlpool waters of life. Ra's al Ghul would listen as he disrobed and immersed himself in the bath.

When the song ended, Ubu knew his master would be emerging from the bath. He folded a cloak of silvery scales over his arm, then took the vial of red pepper and flung it into his eyes, blinding himself temporarily. He then stepped into the antechamber, unable to see Ra's al Ghul in his nakedness, and draped the scaled cloak around his master's shoulders.

* * *

Giovanni D'Annunzio beamed with pleasure at the sound of discreet, manly laughter erupting again from Bruce Wayne's table.

"We hadn't been dating very long," Bruce was saying, "it couldn't have been more than the second or third time I brought her here. Coat check girl, right in front of Selina, tries to give me this fur coat left by some bimbo, Gretta something-or-other, that was like three months before."

Harvey winced. "Leopard?"

Bruce nodded and quoted.

"'But Mr. Wayne, it's _imported snow leopard_. I'm sure Veronica would want it back'—Veronica that was her name. Veronica."

Harvey chuckled. "You are lucky to be alive, my friend."

"In all sorts of ways," Bruce admitted.

"I can hear it now," Harvey went on, still laughing. "'Ix-nay on the oat-cay.' Probably followed by an 'iss-hay', an 'owl-gray', and an 'aw-clay.'"

"Probably," Bruce said readily, pleased at the opening that suggested itself. "Considering how quick you all are with the word play."

"_We all _are? Bruce, please, you know I like thinking of myself in the singular these days."

Bruce smiled. "You know what I mean: that whole Iceberg crowd, Selina's 'friends' among, eh, what is it you call yourselves? 'The rogues.' I've noticed the word play is pretty common, that's all. Must be hanging around with that odd Nigma fellow."

"Eddie," Harvey said amiably. "He's all right."

"Yes, I'm sure," Bruce grumbled, then his manner changed. "Of course, you're in a much better position to be a real friend to her, Harvey. Seeing as she's given up that life and so have you."

Harvey's face darkened.

"She hasn't exactly called, Bruce. Not since that one visit right after…" he gestured to the healed side of his face, formerly scarred into the visage of Two-Face. "It's ironic, you and I lost touch after the acid—"

"Harvey, I—"

"Oh, I don't blame you," Harvey said quickly. "_I_ certainly would have avoided Two-Face if I'd had the option. It's just… now he's gone, you and I sit down to a nice lunch, and Selina seems to have misplaced my phone number."

"You haven't called her either," Bruce pointed out.

"There's an old adage about horses, Bruce: you can lead a one to water, but you can't make it drink. Well you can't even take a damn cat to the water. She'll call me if she wants to, and as she evidently doesn't—"

"Come out to the house then," Bruce interrupted. "_I'm_ inviting you. Saturday. We'll have a barbecue."

Harvey felt an urge to flip for it; his fingers itched to hold a coin and use that to make the decision. He couldn't, of course. To flip a coin, to let Fate make any choice for him, would break the magical bargain Jason Blood had made with the cosmos to heal his face… Still, sometimes, for reasons Harvey couldn't begin to fathom, a part of him ached let go of the responsibility and just let a coinflip decide.

Instead he turned to Bruce and asked, "Why?"

"Because it's summer, and because apart from the annual Wayne Enterprises-Wayne Foundation Labor Day Barbecue, I haven't had a cookout since Dick was twelve."

Harvey laughed broadly. "The Annual Wayne Enterprises-Wayne Foundation Labor Day Barbecue?" he repeated.

"It's just as much fun as it sounds," Bruce noted wryly.

"I don't doubt it. And Saturday, by contrast, would be?"

"The not-since-Dick-was-twelve, Alfred-won't-let-me-touch-the-grill, Selina-will-run-around-in-her-bare-feet, couple steaks, bottle of good wine, shoot the breeze with your old friends."

"You put it like that, I'd be a fool to say I had to 'flip for it', wouldn't I?" Harvey grinned.

* * *

The Lazarus Chamber was essentially a temple, five-sided, built around what appeared to be a small underground lake. Each face of the chamber contained an image of a dragon, a simple altar, and upon each altar, a small ivory tusk. The lake was still and dark, its waters—if water it was—thick and black, emitting a faint, warm smell of sulfur, carbon, and yeast. The odor was masked with a heady blend of exotic incense, burned in special dragonhead dishes at each of five points around the lake. The only light in the chamber came from torches, each held in place by a sconce shaped like a dragon's five-clawed talon.

Ra's al Ghul descended into the chamber, resplendent in the scaled robe which seemed to shimmer eerily in the firelight. The Pit-Stirrers resumed their chant as he circled the Pit. They sang first of Marduk, the first dragon, who slew an evil one and filleted its carcass to create the heavens, the earth, and humanity. Ra's reached the first altar and nodded to the Pit-Stirrer stationed there. The man bowed, took the tusk from the altar, and solemnly carried it to the edge of the Pit. Soon, ripples appeared in the thick, black pool and Ra's proceeded to the next altar. The chant went on to praise Cuculcan, feathered serpent of the Maya and the Olmec…

The New World, Ra's thought, the New World that first seemed so promising: teaming with native peoples who knew the land, knew the spirits, and even knew of the dragon. The Europeans infected that pristine world, as always, with their vile corruption, their religious mania, their industries and diseases, and that vilest of obscenities: democracy. Still, for all its vice and decadence, the New World suggested but one thought to Ra's al Ghul: The Detective. A whole hemisphere's promise and defiance embodied in a single man.

…The chant praised Quetzacoatl, of the Toltecs and the Aztec, whose temple dwarfed the sun and moon… Quetzacoatl, appeased and made strong with the blood of human sacrifice…

Was it really less than a single lifetime since the Detective crossed his path? How was it possible, in less than four swift decades, for one man to amass such knowledge of the world (and of the DEMON organization), that he could not only fight Ra's al Ghul, but succeed? How was it possible that one man, even one with Bruce Wayne's resources, and his undoubted natural gifts, could not only survive these battles with the Demon's Head, but deliver setback after setback?

…Mang, the four-clawed, representing all worldly power…

Rout after rout. Defeat after defeat. One man. It was inconceivable. It wasn't the Mystery Men or living gods of the Justice League that thwarted his stratagems time after time; it was the Detective alone, stubborn and relentless, refusing to let him win. If he could harness that man's will, that drive and talent, Ra's knew he could achieve his aim in a single human lifetime. He would live to see the dream.

…and they sang of Lung Wang, the immortal dragon king who dwelt in a human body…

This would not do.

…By the end of the chant, the black Lazarus waters were stirred by five tusks—by five _claws_—for the five-clawed dragon was the mark of ultimate earthly power, none but the Emperor could display it…

This would not do.

…Ra's then began his descent into the pool. One lone Pit-Stirrer began to chant:

_˜Fire is light.  
˜Fire of the dragon,  
˜Fire than banishes night… _

The vagaries of world domination were a constant and necessary burden, and even to a mind such as Ra's al Ghul's, the discipline required to weigh each new circumstance against a thousand other variables was an endless struggle.

_Fire that banishes darkness,_

But to be absorbed in thoughts of the Detective in the very womb of the Lazarus Pit, it was sacrilege.

_Fire that banishes death,_

Thought was now irrelevant anyway…

_Fire, mysterious and magical,_

Thought floated… clinging to the surface of the waters… like oil… as Ra's let his body sink beneath…

_˜Fire that dances in air,  
˜Fire that whispers and roars,  
˜Breath of the Dragon._

…into the tarry liquid…

_˜Sheng chi, the Breath of the Dragon,_

…his nostrils and ears filling with Lazarus…

_˜Sheng chi, the Breath of the Dragon, is the essence of Life._

…until he knew no more.

* * *

"There we are, miss; if you will hold that ice pack in place," Alfred intoned grimly. "I was pleased to see that Miss Nutmeg has settled back into her accustomed routine after the upheaval."

"I'm sorry, Alfred, did you say something?" Selina asked with exaggerated innocence. "For some reason, I was remembering these Mouawad diamonds that I actually managed to get out of Sotheby's back in the day: emerald cut, 24 carat, lilac-pink stones, just my color. For _six weeks_ he kept at it, every damn time I turned around, there he was. And all business too, not a bit of fun did we have the whole damn time."

"I recall the case, miss. He was quite pleased when he recovered those stones and apprehended the gentleman attempting to fence them. A foreign gentleman, as I recall, with a curious tattoo of a carousel horse—"

"_Yes_, Alfred. He got the gems, he got the fence, he got the money—but he _never_ got me, not until I walked in here that day of my own free will."

"As you say, miss."

"Nobody 'got' me. Ever."

"Indeed, miss."

"So give me a break, Alfred. All I did was kiss a man in a mask one night. I never meant to—OW! Alfred!"

"I do beg your pardon, miss, my hand slipped."

"Mhm. Yeah. Sure. And the Mouawad diamonds were in my cleavage the whole time I—oh, never mind. Look, Alfred, all I mean is… sometimes I just _need to have fun_. Otherwise, he wins, the bad part of him, the PsychoBat part, and I can't allow that. There's no harm in our having a bit of fun now and then."

Alfred's features had hardened into a stern, disapproving intensity that was pure Bat. And Selina met this formidable expression with an equally formidable one of her own, just as stern and just as intense, but substituting feline defiance for the disapproval. After several seconds of this, Alfred finally spoke:

"Miss Selina. I would be the last to deny you or Master Bruce whatever means of… _healthy recreation_ you both found diverting. I would merely caution you against… _displacing_ any of the material improvements that have been made with respect to the Master's homelife, as well as your own, if I might venture to suggest it."

A subtle, girlish smile crept over Selina's lips before she answered.

"You mean that we're both happier since we got together, so don't mess it up?"

"Quite, miss."

"Don't worry, Alfred, a little 'getting back to basics' isn't going to hurt anyth—"

"No, miss," Alfred cut her off firmly. "What you have _here_ are 'the basics', as you put it. What goes on out there, diverting though it may be, is no basis for a relationship or a lifestyle."

Selina glared.

"Alfred, I would have thought a man of your intelligence would have learned by now that the one thing you must never, ever say to any cat is 'NO.'"

The inner cat was tempted to punctuate the remark with a violent hiss, but Selina found that, riled though she was, she wasn't quite capable of hissing at Alfred Pennyworth. So she merely handed him the ice pack, turned on her heel, and left.

* * *

All Ra's al Ghul remembered of the insanity was the burn.

A searing, unquenchable fire devouring his flesh, raging through his veins. The tender membrane of his mouth and eyes erupting into corrosive flames. Spikes of red piercing into his lungs, knives of heat tearing away at his heart, and pain, everywhere red burning pain, devouring him, unquenchable… until a wisp of cool euphoria squelched the fire, just for an instant. The burning soon returned… and then another wave of relief, like cool water poured into his burning mouth, dousing the fire, soothing… just for a moment… until the burning returned, the agony returned, not quite so strong… more coolness, pouring over him, through him, like water… the coolness… a strange euphoria.

Ra's al Ghul opened his eyes, dully noted the overturned altar, candles, and the bodies.

Only his bones still felt the burning fire of the Pit; the rest of his mind and body had eased into the soothing cool of post-dip ecstasy.

"Ubu," he addressed the kneeling figure by name only as a nod to ritual, for Ubu was the only man conscious in the room, possibly the only one still alive after the violence of Ra's madness. But his voice seized with a parched stiffness, and Ubu took it upon himself to rise from his knees (though to do so without leave could mean his life), to pour water into a golden chalice, and to offer this humble tribute to his master before kneeling again at his feet.

Ra's nodded his approval, and resumed the order:

"Ubu, bring us a robe to cover our imperial person, then summon the Ajax-Bravos to scourge the Pit."

"It shall be done, Master," Ubu said, as a matter of form. In fact, the order was already given, and the Ajax-Bravos so honored, as well as the ceremonial robe, were already standing by outside the chamber. "Shall I have them dispatch any of these men who yet live?"

This question too was a formality, for all minions, even the lowly Pit-Stirrers, knew that none may live who witness Ra's al Ghul's madness on emerging from the Lazarus Pit. Even Ubu would offer to take his own life, although the Demon's Head, in his divine mercy, customarily declined the offer.

But in the rapture of post-dip euphoria, Ra's decided on this occasion that all those present might be spared. He donned the Dragon Cloak of Rebirth, and ordered Ubu to fetch the new intelligence reports from America. He felt that now, brimming as he was with renewed energies, he could read them properly, with a fresh eye! And a sharp mind! And the keen insight of a thousand lifetimes that is the wisdom of Ra's al Ghul!

* * *

Gr'oriBr'di was unique in the vast DEMON organization. The Great One had offered to let him keep his original name, even though it was impossibly hard to pronounce. Having no great fondness for the name "Greg Brady" with which his mother had saddled him, nor for "Giggles" as the Joker called him when he served as the mad clown's henchman, Greg was perfectly happy to accept a new designation from his new boss, and Ra's rewarded him with a prestigious second apostrophe.

Greg Brady was also unique in that he had never undergone the formal indoctrination to the DEMON cult which outsiders might call brainwashing. Ra's himself had decreed this: the psyche of Gr'oriBr'di must remain intact, as the man seemed to personify a mysterious X-Factor that only Gothamites possessed, a quality which enabled them to defeat his minions time and again. Ra's hoped Gr'oriBr'di would pass on this X-factor to his minions, that they could battle the Detective on equal terms, as it were, and finally achieve a few wins.

Three of the minions currently posted to Gotham were indeed profiting from Greg Brady's teachings to achieve a win, but their victory was over the other three minions posted to the same base, and the contest underway was stickball—Brooklyn style, losers bought the pizza.

Innovations of this kind were confusing to minions new to the Gotham operation, especially if they were transferred from the fiercer posts in Mongolia, Sumatra, or Kurdistan. But their comrades soon helped them adjust: the first manhole cover was home plate, the next was second base, the one in the outfield was the home run marker. What of He-whose-name-that-can't-be-spoken? Oh yeah, him. Just call him "Batman" here. It's okay, really, even in front of Gr'oriBr'di. Hit the "Spaldeen"—yes, that's the high-bouncing ball—with the mop handle wrapped with black tape. Intelligence reports? Oh sure, place to go is the Iceberg. Talk to Sly, he's a helluva guy. Just don't hit on Roxy Rocket. Best scuttlebutt comes from a guy called Tetch; he knows everything about everybody.

Gr'oriBr'di was pleased when a minion showed signs of growth, venturing out to new parts of the city on his night off, coming back with tales of his adventures. Usually they discovered an arcade or a poker game. Occasionally they'd meet a girl. One developed a profitable side business scalping tickets to the big musicals. When Gr'ori decided that a particular minion had progressed far enough, he quietly sent word to Batman, and that minion, like so many agents of Ra's al Ghul before him, would find himself outmaneuvered by the fearsome vigilante and shipped back to DEMON in disgrace.

Little pockets of discontent had sprung up in the desert compounds, in the castle in Nepal, in the Fagaras Mountains, even the training camp in Eger. Gr'oriBr'di knew that was Batman's aim, eroding the DEMON cult from within. But Greg's own aims were more paternal. He had been a henchman himself, he didn't want to order men around like robots, he wanted to hang with them as brothers in arms. His efforts to introduce them to some semblance of a normal life were sincere and guileless—as they had been with Talia.

He had reached out to the girl. She was so screwed up, it was hard not to feel for her. Hell, it was hard not to like her. She'd get so worked up over the dumbest stuff, need the simplest damn things pointed out to her, and then light up like Christmas morning—for nothing, for a tickle fight or a trip to the pizza joint. And then, she up and dumps him—without even telling him she was dumping him—to go chasing after Bats. Some dumb mixed up idea she had about Bats. I mean, everybody in DEMON knew she was totally screwed up where Batman was concerned, but Greg thought they were past all that. Then, ten minutes back in Gotham City and she was off again. What was a guy supposed to do, just be a doormat?

"Bossman!" Ig'thar called. "P'Tal demanded a 'do-over' because a car turned into the street before he could swing, but Ta'long said the do-over is a stain upon honor and challenged him to a blood joust."

Greg sighed.

"Coming," he called, wearily. A blood joust. Some days. DEMON. He almost missed henching for Joker.

* * *

Ra's couldn't believe how blind he had been, so weighed down had he become with the despondency of old age, he had missed all the signs in these promising reports from Gotham!

He had sat down to supper at once, his body famished from the rebirthing ceremony, and his appetites were ravenous after the bland fare forced on him by his body's rapid pre-dip decline. He ordered a large, elaborate meal: mullet with piquant sauce, fat thrushes stuffed with dates and forcemeat, wild boar with truffles, those delicious fig cakes, and, of course a large pitcher of that excellent Cyprian wine.

This last, Ra's al Ghul gulped excitedly while his eyes scanned the key words in the report.

The Detective had sent away his concubine! The feline was sent away from Wayne Manor! The Detective was still keeping her, Ra's noted… in the penthouse of his business citadel, it seemed. Well, that was understandable. They could wink at that, between men. But he had removed her from his home, and surely there could be but one reason for that.

Talia was in Gotham. The dispatches made that quite clear, and yet the accounts from the Chinatown base were more than circumspect. Gr'oriBr'di and his men were certainly _aware_ of her presence in the city, but they tactfully omitted details, CLEARLY shielding his fatherly eyes from those _particulars_ with respect to his daughter's blossoming romance with the Detective. At last! At last he was to have that heir, a true heir of his bloodline yet sired by a worthy and well-born warrior, one who would be fit to stand at his side as… as _Tenente al Ghul!_

No, perhaps not. While the title might literally indicate the Detective was to become an honored lieutenant of the Demon, it sounded rather like the Batman was renting a room above Ra's al Ghul's garage.

_Mestre al Ghul_? No, that would never do. Whereas it was meant to indicate an Overseer of the Demon's minions, it sounded more like the Detective was named master of the Demon himself…

Well, he had time, (9 months, at least) to come up with a suitable title. The nomenclature could wait. What could not wait was traveling to Gotham City to formally welcome Bruce Wayne into the family!

* * *

…to be continued…

* * *

Author's Notes: Much of the _Mergulho al Ghul _ceremony inspired by the History Channel special _Quest for Dragons_ and the book on which it is based: _An Instinct for Dragons_ by David E. Jones, as well as the role-playing creativity of Travis Bickle, who pens Twofaced Tales.

More of Greg "Giggles" Brady's story can be found in _Splitzville,_ _Strange Bedfellows, and Deja Vu All Over Again_.


	2. Needs Salt

**Napoleon's Plan**  
_Chapter 2: Needs Salt_

* * *

There are men of Bruce Wayne's stature in the world who could not tell you the precise location of the kitchen in their homes. Bruce had never isolated himself that way, but his visits to the butler's pantry were rare. He viewed the little room off the kitchen as Alfred's private space and was always reluctant to disturb him there. Bruce would naturally buzz the intercom if he needed something urgently, but otherwise he waited until he ran into Alfred in the cave, or in the study—or, if all else failed, when Alfred woke him in the morning.

So it was something of an occasion when Bruce knocked on the door to the pantry—with a surprisingly cheery demeanor at that ("Got a minute, Alfred?"). So much so that Alfred stood, removing his glasses, and heard himself offering tea as if Bruce was an unexpected guest who dropped by for a social visit. Bruce refused the tea but took a cookie from the little plate on the table. Then he straddled the chair backwards. Alfred found the whole performance puzzling at first. It was a challenge, most days, to get Bruce to eat food pushed on him. For him to casually walk into the room and help himself to a cookie that hadn't even been offered.

At that moment Bruce grinned… and Alfred realized with a start what seemed so strange about the whole scene.

"You haven't visited me like this for several years, young sir," Alfred remarked, in a less formal tone than he generally used with the adult Bruce Wayne.

"Almost as long as it's been since you've called me 'young sir,'" Bruce said casually, his voice, like his grin, an almost unsettling throwback to an earlier time. Bruce explained briefly about the barbecue: just one guest, Harvey Dent. Nothing elaborate, a couple steaks, pitcher of cold drinks, sit outside, that kind of thing.

"One guest only, sir?" Alfred asked, incredulous.

"Yeah, will just be the three of us," Bruce nodded, smiling. "No fuss like the Labor Day shindigs. Just a lazy Saturday afternoon, old friends catching up and all that."

Alfred started to speak and then stopped, reconsidering how to phrase it.

"Am I to understand, sir, that you have invited Mr. Harvey Dent to come to the manor and share a meal with you and Miss Selina for no other reason than you expect you will _enjoy his company_?"

Bruce's eyes narrowed, and the magic spell was broken. The boyish grin, the light demeanor, all the echoes of that earlier time flickered away at the question. Anyone else, even Superman, would have accepted the piercing stare as a dismissal, but Alfred raised a determined eyebrow and waited impassively until he received a verbal reply.

"Yes," Bruce growled in a deep bat-gravel.

"What a novel idea," Alfred remarked.

"He _was_ once my friend," Bruce said defensively, in a curious contrast to the Bat-bluster of a moment before. "And he's Selina's friend. It's not that strange an idea is it? Have him over. Get the two of them talking again. You must admit, she can probably use some kind of support. Somebody from that world she can talk to… someone who won't try to play on her vulnerabilities like that _Nigma_."

"I see, sir. Then this is not, perhaps, as casual and impulsive an entertainment as you have stated?"

Bruce said nothing for a long minute, during which Alfred noted an alarming creaking sound coming from the chairback.

"Your fist, sir," Alfred noted dryly. "That chair represents a fine piece of 19th Century French country craftsmanship, but I don't believe the spindle is meant to be clutched in that way, certainly not by a man of your size and strength."

Bruce opened his fist mechanically at the rebuke, then spoke in the deadliest growl.

"He used her, Alfred. Her _good_ _friend_ 'Eddie' used her like a pawn… to get to me. I can't… Harvey would never do that to her, even in his Two-Face days. He might flip a coin to decide whether to shoot at her or not, but… it's not the same somehow. It doesn't cross that line between…"

"Master Bruce?"

Bruce looked up but said nothing.

"Sir, there is obviously more on your mind than the relative merits of Mr. Dent and Mr. Nigma as friendly companions for Miss Selina."

Bruce's lip twitched.

"I don't really know if it's the sort of thing… I mean to talk about…" Bruce stopped, shook his head, and softly chuckled.

"Master Bruce," Alfred said in a tone of such affectionate indulgence, so different from his usual understated sarcasm, that Bruce was forced to look up. "You have not visited this room for a casual chat in many, many years. You obviously have some matter you wish to confide, and I think you know by now, sir, that you can place the utmost confidence in my discretion."

Bruce moistened his lips thoughtfully and tamed the grinning chuckle back to his accustomed liptwitch.

"It's not that, Alfred. It's not a question of trust; it's just somewhat… odd… It's… boy, now I try to say it, it really is… Alfred. Batman and Catwoman are having an affair."

* * *

Once, after a particularly vicious Hell Month beating, Selina signed Harvey Dent's legcast with the words "You really are Fate's bitch." Stumbling into the Harvard Club, rain pouring from his hair, his jacket, and his blown out umbrella, Harvey had never felt it to be so true.

That cursed cab: Cab #220, he should have known, he really should have known that was a bad omen. But he got in anyway and promptly got stuck in the midday, midtown traffic snarl. Deciding it was better to walk than sit there watching the meter click away, Harvey paid his modest fare… with a painful recollection of a day not that long ago when he would have had to flip his coin to decide whether to pay the fare or shoot the driver, twice, with a .22. He couldn't have walked more than a block when the skies darkened. He couldn't have walked more than two before they opened in the kind of instant, drenching downpour that only occur in late summer. Harvey ran, cursing, to the nearest shelter while the wind and rain intensified. It was only once he stopped under the awning that he realized where he was: Barristers' Alley it was called, a two-block stretch between the District Court and City Hall that was crowded with law offices: trial attorneys, patent attorneys, tax attorneys, corporate attorneys—and the eclectic restaurants and taverns they favored to meet in. The finest and most exclusive of these was the Barristers' Club, under whose awning Harvey had unwittingly taken shelter from the rain.

Harvey had diligently rebuilt those parts of his life that he _could _rebuild: he restocked his wardrobe with suits not divided down the center, he reactivated his memberships in the Harvard Club and the Racquet Club, he had reestablished tentative friendships with a few old cohorts like Bruce Wayne. But there were parts of Harvey Dent's old life that were gone for good: Gilda, that dream of a wife and family, his political ambitions, and of course the law. He was disbarred years ago, he was a convicted criminal, there was no question of his ever being able to practice law again. So he avoided this part of town, avoided any reminder of those parts of his life he could never get back. Hence why he wasn't dating.

And now Fate, that faithless witch Fate, must have grown bored. She must have noticed her old pal Harvey Dent hadn't been seen for a while, and she'd gone looking for him: Enter Cab #220 and a rainstorm that deposits him at the Barristers' Club just in time to spy Ed Zinc coming out.

Ed Zinc.

Jesus Christ.

In Harvey's day, Zinc was a junior associate called Scooter. That was the kind of awe the man inspired. The rapier wit, the penetrating insight, the dynamic personality, the brilliant legal mind: Scooter. _Scooter Zinc_ was coming out of _the Barristers' Club _in a slate-gray Armani.

"…just bought a Lexus," the walking pustule was saying, "now Karen can use the Hummer for the kids."

"Why not," the toady walking alongside him chimed in. "They offered you a partnership at Deene, Devin, and Toloich right? Winning streak like yours, they'd be dumb not to."

"Well it is a fact," Zinc preened himself while the poor doorman waded into the downpour to get them a taxi. "Winning as a prosecutor bodes well for your ability to get them off as a defense attorney."

"And that's where the money is," the toady added, like the pasty-faced kissup that he was, like the pasty-faced kissup that _Ed Zinc_ used to be. How often had Harvey heard this conversation before, after he himself or a colleague had a high-profile win and the offers came flooding in? Power breakfast at the Barristers' was the usual place to be seen the next day, taking a bow in the center ring of Gotham legal circles, and what better way to mark your grand exit than with a fawning little toady like Scooter Zinc trailing after you, enumerating all your kudos so you didn't have to yourself.

"And, of course, once I'm no longer working for the city, we can move out to Connecticut. So much better for the kids. Did I tell you Karen is expecting again?"

Harvey tasted blood. Literally. He had bit his tongue. Scooter Zinc: a partnership at Deene, Devin and Toloich, wife expecting again, a house in Connecticut. Scooter Zinc was living the life Harvey Dent was supposed to have. SCOOTER ZINC was??

In his mind's eye he envisioned tying Scooter up in a very specific posture he'd learned from Joker: bind the feet, tie the waist around a vertical support, then wrap each arm around a long horizontal plank, crucifixion-style. Only then bind the wrists, taking care to run the rope behind the neck so the more they try to pull lose, the more they'll tighten the knot. Then, suspend the whole thing above a vat of acid—or fire—or leeches—or razor blades—or molten lava. But since it was a Joker deathtrap, he'd always opted for the acid. Joker just let them hang there until they regained consciousness, then lowered them slowly on a pulley. He didn't care about any kind of duality in the mechanism or any instrument of chance determining the victim's fate. Two-Face cared very much and spent long hours trying to come up with an appropriate two-related trigger to drop the victim into the acid…

While enjoying the mental image of Ed Zinc sweating bullets as his legs neared the smoldering firepit, of his gritting his teeth as he pulled against the bonds, of his simpering when the cuff of his silk Armani started to sizzle, Harvey reminded Two-Face sharply that they had not flipped for it and even Ed Zinc deserved a fifty-fifty chance of…

Uh oh.

There _was_ no more Two-Face. Harvey reminded _himself_ of that important fact just as sharply as he'd tried to remind Two-Face about the coin: There _was no more Two-Face._ There was no firepit, no imprisoned Edward Zinc, and most importantly, there was no more Two-Face.

Just a slip. It was just a slip; everybody does that. Harmless little fantasy: you see a no-talent, good-for-nothing shit, who if there was any justice in the world would be parking cars at the Hard Rock, enjoying all the success that should have been be yours, it's perfectly natural to set them up in that mental shooting gallery and aim a double-barreled shotgun at their dribbling double chin.

But that wasn't the worst of it. The worst came as Harvey stood there with the rain slanting inward, soaking him almost as badly as if he wasn't standing under any awning at all, and he realized he was waiting for Two-Face to laugh at him. That coarse laughter, mocking him for being such a chump. Of course no laughter came, because Two-Face was gone.

"That's two," he told the ghost of his alter ego. He'd been suckered—twice.

* * *

"I don't think I understand, sir," Alfred said carefully. "Batman and Catwoman are _having an affair?_"

Bruce expected that reaction. He knew how the statement sounded but that really was the only way to phrase it.

"Alfred, you've seen enough of secret identities to know that—"

"I am aware, sir, of the tendency to 'compartmentalize' aspects of your life, but I fail to see… That is to say, sir, you and Miss Selina have enjoyed an intimate relationship for a number of years now. I fail to see—"

"_Bruce_ and _Selina_ have, yes. When it started getting serious, even before the masks came off it was… it was _me_, and it was her. This is different. This is… the first… the old…"

He trailed off, lost in some private thought. Alfred coughed. And Bruce took a new approach to the story.

"It was the night of the MOMA opening. She needed it. I guess I did too. Hugo Strange and mind games, talk about marriage and mortality. It was just a release. Bit of escapism…"

He trailed off again. It _was_ nothing more than a bit of escapist fun; they both knew it.

What neither was prepared for was the morning after. Bruce had stirred first, the deepest folds of his subconscious noting, as it always did, specific physical realities. He was not in bed. It wasn't the hard coldness of an alley under his body… nor were his limbs bound or contorted in a deathtrap. It was just… not a bed… _And his mask was on._ That detail jolted him awake, fully in Bat-mode.

It was a second at most until he processed his surroundings—the penthouse—the living room floor of the penthouse to be precise—Catwoman, naked apart from the mask, tangled in his cape and curled against him… It was a second at most, but it was enough, he woke _as Batman_ in that moment. And there she was: Catwoman. They'd done it. Batman and Catwoman. They'd done it.

He lay there in the quiet stillness, watching her sleep, the thought billowing through his mind like an atomic mushroom cloud: what if they really had done it back then? It could have happened, it almost did more than once. A vault or a rooftop, or following her like this back to her lair, a moment's lapse of control… They danced on that precipice so often, it could have happened, more easily than he let himself admit back then… What if they did?

What if they did?

He couldn't arrest her now—maybe he never could, maybe he was kidding himself about that—but now, she lay there sleeping, wrapped in his cape, some cat or other purring in the distance, and all he could think of was the way she had looked the night before, her head tipped back, flushed, panting… He closed his eyes and relived the moment… then another, then another. And when he opened his eyes again she was awake—and looking at him—and unless he was much mistaken, she was thinking the exact same thought: What if we had?

The moment froze. Those eyes of hers, framed by that mask.

"Good morning," she said softly. She meant _Don't spoil it._ Don't break the spell.

What if we had?

There was no Bruce Wayne. There was no Selina Kyle. They didn't exist. There was certainly no Wayne Penthouse. It was just a catlair.

With his right hand, he gently cradled the side of her face, his thumb lightly caressing her cheek as it played across the edge of her mask, then he kissed her cheek. "Good morning," he graveled just outside the mask by her ear. Then he dressed silently and left.

They never spoke of it when she returned to the manor, not a word or a hint, not so much as a glance alluded to it.

It was as if it never happened—until the next night when, almost on a whim, he passed through the diamond district at the end of his patrol. It was part of her territory from the old days but still an important part of the city to keep an eye on. Then he passed the parkfront condos, also favorite Catwoman targets, and finally museum row. And there she was, on that raised section of the Metropolitan's roof. It was an amateur's way into the museum. They had a food cart up there and a few outdoor sculptures: that necessitated two elevators, one for the people and one for the art. Catwoman was above such an obvious—

"Sir?" Alfred's voice pulled Bruce reluctantly from the memory, his cheeks warming with a sudden flush.

"I'm sorry, Alfred, did you say something?" he stammered.

Alfred sighed, clearly frustrated.

"Nothing, sir. I shall make the necessary arrangements for Saturday's barbecue. Will there be anything else?"

* * *

After such a morning, Harvey felt a strong need to touch some bit of his old life. He stopped in Bergdorf's Men's Annex, shot a wary glance across the street at the southwest entrance to Robinson Park, and then proceeded inside the store and bought himself a new tie—and an umbrella, as he was not about to get caught in a downpour twice in one day. Thus refreshed, he went to the Harvard Club. After a lengthy ordeal drying off in the lobby, he settled in the lounge, picked a newspaper off the stack on the table, and began to read… Harvey did a double take: Catman? the MOMA opening? But that was—then he checked the newspaper's date. It was several days old.

Richard Flay came over, smiling agreeably. And Harvey noted that Flay was pictured in the news story, along with several other men in tuxedoes, presumably the museum board. Of course, that's why he'd kept the paper laying around all this time.

"Such a splendid evening before that uncouth ruffian made such a shambles of the party," Flay said mildly.

Harvey glanced down at the newspaper, a quote set apart from the rest of the story in a box: _Such a splendid evening before that uncouth ruffian made such a shambles of the party. _

"Eh. Yes. Quite," Harvey answered cautiously. He knew this was the way with Gotham socialites but he couldn't get used to it: they all knew he had been Two-Face, but it would be rude to allude to that, like offering extra ice to someone rescued off the Titanic. So they'd walk right up and say what a pity it was about that uncouth ruffian Catman, without once considering that to him Catman was Tom Blake, who he'd punched out one night at the Iceberg for calling Selina a flea-bitten she-cat, and another time for saying if Harvey went to karaoke night he must've sung _I Am My Own Best Friend,_ and who Harvey had taken (under duress) on a roadtrip to Key West, along with Joker and Riddler, to bring Sly the bartender back to the Iceberg, until they all got sick of him and left him at the side of the road somewhere in the Carolinas with a stolen BMW and a neo-nazi auto mechanic. Blake was a blister and Harvey didn't like him. But it was still strange to be on this end of a conversation about those awful costumed rogues.

Flay prattled on. "Of course the real pity of the evening was this fabulous new performance artist who presented such a challenging piece that's been completely overlooked…"

Harvey tuned out most of the story. He knew Richard Flay was a big shot in the arts world and always worked up about something. In fact, few connoisseurs were as astute as Richard Flay, fine arts professor at Hudson University, essayist, collector and patron… and a homosexual. He was seldom wrong about a new artist's potential, but on those rare occasions when he overestimated some new figure's artistic merit, the figure nearly always belonged to a handsome younger man. And so it was with "this electrifying new performance artist" _Greg Brady_.

Harvey started at the name.

Flay, like all the other guests at the gala, had seen the strapping young man crash the party and angrily denounce his faithless lover. But Richard Flay alone had recognized the scene as a challenging piece of performance art, in the truest spirit of the Museum of Modern Art.

"Did you say 'Greg Brady'?" Harvey asked, weak with shock.

"Greg Brady," Flay confirmed the name eagerly. "Inspired, isn't it? A pop icon of the 1970s, the era of the sexual revolution, but a figure removed from the threatening gender confusion of the period, insulated in a sanitized world of the television sitcom. The actress that played his lover bore a striking resemblance to that Metropolis woman, Talia Head: a failed CEO, a searing indictment of the woman-lover archetype - somewhat murky in its symbolism, perhaps, but that's the only explanation for the references to arranged marriages, 1911, and Edward V or whatever it was."

Harvey blinked.

"Greg Brady?" he asked again.

"Greg Brady," Flay repeated, pronouncing the name with a wistful awe. "I would have so liked to speak with him afterwards, to discuss that magnificent allegory: it is the technology of the information age which exposes this Talia's infidelity."

Harvey noticed that his mouth had dropped open, and he realized he must be staring at Richard Flay with a doltish gape. He cleared his throat with a determined grunt and straightened his tie.

"Well eh, yes, that sounds quite interesting. I mean, I know nothing about art, but the grant application writes itself, surely."

Richard Flay walked off happily, not unlike Jervis after imparting some juicy bit of gossip.

* * *

Ra's al Ghul's mind was full of plans as his plane circled for its final approach into Gotham. There was the minor question of Gr'oriBr'di, for the man entrusted with the important outpost in The Detective's city in this hour of DEMON'S great triumph must be granted some special mark of distinction. But Gr'oriBr'di had already received a second apostrophe, and Ra's was uncertain what greater honor he dared bestow: a place in the wedding procession would be far too dangerous. Gr'oriBr'di was a Gothamite, afterall, to raise him so high at the very moment the Detective finally took his place at Ra's side as heir presumptive, it could be perceived as a Gotham _faction_ rising within the DEMON hierarchy, and placed so near the throne, it practically invited a coup d'etat!

So some other boon was called for, something that recognized Gr'oriBr'di's service but kept him safely out of the way. A new assignment, perhaps; for Gotham, once the conquest was complete, would be the Detective's Fife, there could be no question about that. Gr'oriBr'di would have to be reassigned… Hm, perhaps he could have the honor of executing those "Rogues" whose deaths were to constitute Ra's al Ghul's wedding gift to The Detective—to Bruce Wayne, that is. Ra's reminded himself that the days of "The Detective" and "Ra's al Ghul" formality were nearing a close. Once the man had sired an heir of his blood, it would be woefully uncivilized to continue addressing each other by these formal titles. Ra's would address the Detective as "Bruce", and Bruce Wayne would be the first man in a thousand years privileged to call the Demon's Head "_Akhenanpu_."

* * *

Harvey had never felt such an urge to flip that coin. He was burning with curiosity as to what on earth Joker's henchman "Giggles" a.k.a. Oswald's former bouncer Greg Brady could be doing with Talia al Ghul… He had avoided contact with the old Iceberg crowd now that he'd turned his back on rogue life, just as he had avoided City Hall and Barristers' Alley, but there was no way to find out more without renewing contact. He wanted to learn more, he wanted to avoid the Iceberg… He wanted to know more… and he wanted to avoid the Iceberg…

As much as he told himself he was completely overjoyed with his change in fortune, the truth was he'd found his new life somewhat… dull—well, not _dull_ exactly, not "a let down," those terms were too harsh. But this little taste of a rogue mystery made it impossible to deny that he was, in fact, missing something in his new life. His new life… needed salt.

He wanted to know more… and he wanted to avoid the Iceberg…

It was a fearsome choice. He had cut all ties with his old life. If he went so far as to venture into the Iceberg and ask around, could he trust himself not to be sucked in?

He wanted to know more… and he wanted to avoid the Iceberg…

It was a fearsome choice—and Harvey's fingers itched to take the decision out of his hands with a coin flip. He wouldn't have to trust his judgment; he wouldn't be responsible for the consequences…

…Good lord, except for the part where he reneged on the magical bargain with the universe and the healing of his face was reversed. Except the part where Two-Face returned, all because Harvey Dent was too cowardly to make a decision.

Harvey felt his heart pulsing and palpitating like a jackhammer—he'd come that close! He didn't have a coin in his hand or anything, but he was literally thinking about flipping a coin having forgotten, just for that one moment, what the price would be.

Dear god…

Well then, there was nothing for it, he simply had to decide one way or another. And if he opted not to go, he would go on being curious and the temptation would go on and on, day after day, until in a moment of weakness he might flip that coin. Whereas if he simply went back to the Iceberg, then the decision was made and he wouldn't have to deal with it again.

It was better than nothing. So Harvey stepped out into the street and hailed a cab. #193. He smiled. That would do very nicely.

* * *

Talia thought the "grilled stickies" at "Ye Olde College Diner" were, without question, the most revolting foodstuff she had ever experienced. It was some kind of bread—sweet, eggy, buttery bread, which might have been fine on its own, but then it was immersed in this hideous cinnamon-sugary goo. Then they fried it, or sautéed it or… they did _something_ to it involving heat and pans that made the whole kitchen thick with a heavy, greasy, warmish cloud of… of… she couldn't even describe that smell. It was as if the mustard gas of World War I was reinvented using cinnamon! What kind of human beings could devise this kind of an assault on the senses? It was, without question, the second most disgusting foodstuff in existence. The _most_ disgusting were the "Stickies Royale" where they took the "Famous Original Grilled Stickies" and slathered them in a whitish icing that tasted like… like… like what she could only imagine plastic would taste like if melted and mixed into sugar, corn syrup, and _more cinnamon_.

Never—_NEVER_—had her father's teachings of the vile ruin of Western Civilization seemed so valid. Stickies Royale, what kind of people could think up a substance like this?

* * *

Oswald couldn't believe his good fortune when Raven knocked discreetly on his office door and announced that "Harvey Fullface" had returned to the Iceberg. Oswald had heard about the miraculous transformation but hadn't seen it in person. He waddled eagerly out of his office and saw Harvey's profile as he sat at the bar. It looked the same as always, so Oswald walked casually to the far side of the room, then turned back to see Harvey's other profile—IT MATCHED! Oswald stared, awe-struck at the change, until Harvey finished whatever he was saying to Sly and winked, mischievously—spooking Oswald into a startled kwak.

Sly retreated respectfully to the far end of the bar, and Oswald waddled up to address Harvey at close quarters.

"Didn't think you were going to admit you were looking," Harvey teased when Oswald was close enough to hear.

After a bit of haughty quacking, Oswald permitted himself "to extend felonious felicitations to our prodigal prosecutor."

Harvey hid his disgust, as he always had, at the affected mistreatment of the English language. Privately he wondered why on earth he'd come back to this place. When Joker, Penguin, or Killer Moth were his only options for company with his evening scotch, he'd considered it a penance. Now that he had a whole cityfull of non-freaks to commiserate with, he'd come back to the Iceberg Lounge. God help him, he was actually amused to see Oswald Cobblepot.

"The Cobblepots were a warrior people, we heal quickly," Oswald was saying excitedly. "But nevertheless, it was a frightful experience-_kwak_, as Bat-encounters go, and I felt myself lucky to escape without any fracturing of my beak."

"Yes, I'm sure," Harvey agreed. He'd always wondered how a miserable physical specimen like Oswald survived a bat-encounter.

"Well, as I say, the super-ibuprophen has taken care of the swelling, but my shoulder still aches a good deal. The experience called for a certain redefining of the Iceberg services and related fees. Sly! Show Mr. Dent the new menu, if you please."

Oswald puffed up proudly as Harvey read the new document.

"Alibis," Harvey muttered, "that's nothing new, you were always padding our tab, my tab, Two-Face's tab that is, with some alibi charge or another."

"That was quite different," Oswald explained with the smooth manner of a salesman used to explaining subtle differences in the product line. "If something happens elsewhere in Gotham, like say the robbing of the Second National Bank or the blowing up of the Second Street Bridge, when your good self actually was here in the bar chatting with Sly, I fully understand the need to say where you were between the hours of midnight and 2 a.m. if a masked vigilante has you hanging by your heels from a batline. But the reality, my good fellow, is that when someone says they were at the Iceberg, Batman is then going to show up, kicking over tables and choking the proprietor –kwak!– and there must be some sort of compensation for that inconvenience."

"You always charged us twice," Harvey reminded him acidly.

"You are, or were, two men; it is only reasonable that you each pay your fair share."

Harvey shook his head, almost admiring the boldface greed.

"But as I say, that was then. The new Iceberg is …curtailing certain of those activities which—"

"Which bring on too much Bat-heat?" Harvey interrupted, eyebrow raised.

"Eh quite," Oswald admitted, although he himself would have phrased it differently. "So I shall be leaving the high-risk endeavors to younger men, for a time –_kwak_– but in order to keep the nest well-feathered, we are rolling out these new programs. Read on, Harvey, I think you'll be most impressed."

"Deluxe 'Golden Egg' Package," Harvey read dutifully, "With the Golden Egg Package, you get a DVD copy of timecoded security footage that puts you undeniably inside the Iceberg at the time of the robbery/kidnapping/hijacking."

"And an Iceberg employee of at least Gina's seniority will claim to have spoken to you," Oswald added. "There is a 20 surcharge for Raven, however."

"What about Sly?" Harvey asked, curious.

"If you have to ask, you cannot afford Sly," Oswald said dryly.

Harvey chuckled and stole a glance at the guileless bartender. Oswald went on with his sales pitch.

"If you don't take the Golden Egg package, you're stuck with the economy or 'Sitting Duck' package, wherein someone with a serious drinking problem and dubious mental competence will say they saw you come in with Elvis." He paused for effect then added, "We recommend the Deluxe Package."

* * *

Selina felt quite ridiculously happy. Like any woman days into a new love affair, she was primping. Like any cat discovering cream, she was savoring the sweet linger of yesterday's pleasures and purring in anticipation of tomorrow's.

The primping consisted of new eye shadow, her eyes being the focus of attention when she was masked, and a new hairstyle, just as long, but curlier. "A froth of curls," Antonio called it. Selina was still uncertain if she preferred the new look as Selina Kyle, but there was no question the fullness of the curls was more striking pouring from under her cowl.

The cat's anticipation took a different form. She had quietly evicted Mr. Freeze from an old cat lair she'd lent him to store his spare coldsuits, and was busily arranging to have it refurnished in its former, feline glory. She was also scrutinizing the Lifestyle section of the Gotham Times as she hadn't for years. If Batman wanted to play, she would be happy to oblige, but it was _Batman_ she wanted and Batman she would have. Not Batman's body, not Bruce in a batsuit, but the whole man, the complete crimefighter. She wanted that mind of his as well as the deliciously muscular exterior, and that meant finding some serious cat targets again. Something clever and playful, nothing obvious like the museum's Egyptian wing. Something delectably unexpected. Something to make him sit up and take notice. Something… Cat-worthy.

* * *

…to be continued…


	3. Two Fronts

_Chapter 3: Two Fronts_

* * *

To hear Ra's al Ghul tell it, he had warned Napoleon about fighting a war on two fronts. He was such a promising fellow; Ra's so wanted to help. But you couldn't talk sense to a stubborn little Corsican: Napoleon was determined to make an example of Czar Alexander, so he marched into Russia while he still faced rebellion in Spain. Instead of dazzling the world with his overwhelming strength, all he did was show them he was no longer the man he had been.

Selina Kyle knew better. Going down to breakfast the morning of the barbecue, she too was faced with war on two fronts: Batman and Alfred. Batman was responding with unexpected aggression to her escalation of their nightly game. The first night when he didn't find her at one of the obvious "pick up spots" near Cartier or the art museum, he probably considered it a fluke. The second night, purrhaps he started to wonder. After the third, Bruce didn't speak to her at breakfast and she found a tiny bat-shaped homing device embedded in her boot. Selina was certain what the Control Freak Crusader _really_ objected to was a twist in the game that he didn't initiate, so she wasn't about to give any ground. _Selina_ he could have whenever he pleased, but if he wanted "Catwoman" again, he'd have to find her.

The second battlefront, Alfred's determined effort to domesticate her into some sort of socialite-hostess with a catsuit under her bed, was a much trickier proposition. She wasn't about to let any man make her a housecat, least of all _Batman's_ housecat, but she had found something warm and unexpectedly wonderful in making a life with Bruce, something deeper and more strangely compelling than the lusty pull of those rooftop Bat-games. Plus there was the other little reality that her most effective battle tactics, those related to the whip and claws as well as the hipsway and naughty grin, were not an option against an adversary like Alfred Pennyworth.

Cats do not surrender, nor do they compromise. It's their chair/pillow/terrace and that's that. If human doesn't understand, the lesson will be repeated until he figures it out. But if it is a sacred principle that cats do not retreat, it is just as important that they don't _lose_. And fighting a war on two fronts, particularly against two such formidable opponents, was the road to Waterloo.

Cats will not retreat or compromise – but they will strike a bargain, and Selina was prepared to make a few gestures with Alfred in exchange for postponing their contest until she had vanquished this other foe.

* * *

Oswald Cobblepot was worried.

First it was Raven, his hostess. The one time he'd asked her to stay after closing to help with the inventory, she'd opened her purse and pointed out her brass knuckles, pepper spray, and the business card of one Morris Kleinschmidt, _Sexual Harassment Attorney_. Yet today Raven had come into work, taken one look at him and cooed! She positively _cooed_ at him, like a rare specimen of Peach-Faced Lovebird rather than the coarse squawking raven.

Then Gina came in, walked right past him as she always did to stow her purse in her locker, came back into the dining room to take her station… and got this funny look on her face. "Good to see you're on time tonight, Miss Hempstead," Oswald quacked irritably – in reply to which, she hugged him.

Sparrow, the new cocktail waitress, now addressed him as "Oh Ozzy-Wozzy," Brenda ruffled his hair, Gloria pinched his cheek, and Janet touched her finger to the tip of his nose.

Oswald was quite seriously worried. Could he be ill? Dying even? And no one would tell him? Something was happening, that much was certain. Something had stirred this strange affectionate sympathy in all the lovely ladies on his staff, and whatever it was, it couldn't be good news if they all knew and he didn't.

* * *

Selina entered the Wayne Manor dining room, prepared to make peace on one front to buy victory on the other. She saw Foe #1 entrenched for a protracted siege (Bruce was already sitting at the table reading his newspaper), while the subtler Foe #2 had laid a cunning ambush (Alfred left the day's menus next to her coffee cup).

They helped themselves at breakfast, so Selina went first to the sideboard, poured herself a glass of orange juice, and stole a sideways glance at Bruce. His eyes did not appear to be moving across the newspaper, which meant he wasn't reading the page he was looking at but displaying the reverse side for her benefit.

She was in no hurry to read whatever that message was, so she took her time spooning scrambled eggs onto her plate, taking a strip of bacon, and then surveying the pastry basket as if she was window shopping at Jimmy Choo… Hm, try on the round-toe pump or no? There wasn't a peep from the belfry, not an audible breath, not so much as a crinkling of that newspaper. Selina's inner-cat wanted to hiss. He was used to hours of fruitless surveillance; he could wait her out. So she took an English muffin and returned to her place at the table. Still the newspaper didn't budge, but Selina was certain she could perceive the lip-twitch going on back there.

She briefly noted the headline he wished her to see. It was the financial section. Wayne Tech beat out Star Labs in a bid to manufacture a new "Smart Chip." The message was clear enough: Wayne Wins.

Mm-hm. If she wasn't already decided, that would have done it. Selina picked up the menu, which represented the other enemy's latest broadside: Alfred had presented her with a menu that was, quite simply, _insane_. She would have to go to him and _fix it_ or else, if she stubbornly refused to play Mistress of the manor and let it stand as it was, she would wind up with

"A lunch for 22 people."

"I don't understand, Miss; you wish to make some alteration to the menu?" Alfred asked, all innocence, when she broached the subject.

Selina closed her eyes and summoned up the image of an arrogant bat-lip twitching madly behind a newspaper reading WAYNE WINS. There was a more pressing battle for which kitty had to save her strength.

"Yes, Alfred. I want to change the menu. Because it's just me, Bruce, and Harvey this afternoon. He's going to think this is either a bizarre, retroactive tribute to Two-Face or else we're feeding a football team."

Alfred gave a pleased nod.

"Very well Madam, er, _Miss_ Selina that is. I expect I was somewhat over-enthusiastic; it has been quite a long time since Master Bruce entertained purely for _recreational_ purposes. Such a pleasant change in his demeanor in recent years, don't you agree? What modifications would you wish to make to the luncheon menu?"

Selina managed a frozen grin in reply. He was rubbing it in, obviously, but there was nothing for it unless they really did invite the Gotham Generals over to gobble up the leftovers.

"I think we can do without the corn & tomato salad, the turnip greens, the potato salad, the barbecue chicken, the kabobs, the green peppers, and the lemon meringue pie."

Alfred ran a pencil approvingly through each line as Selina listed the items to be removed. Selina stared for a full second, envisioning Lex Luthor for some inexplicable reason…

"Very good, Miss. That leaves only the steaks – will the ginger-teriyaki rub be acceptable, or do you prefer some other seasoning for aged beef?"

Yep, Lex Luthor, flushed with victory because she had successfully escaped with the computer disks he wanted "stolen" from his office, and then _pushing it _because he thought he'd won, smugly refusing to pay her fee because her appearance brought Batman and Superman into the equation and thwarted his larger scheme.

"Why yes, Alfred," Selina answered crisply, just as Catwoman had answered the complacently conceited Luthor, "The ginger-teriyaki dry rub sounds absolutely delicious."

"Very good then, the steaks with ginger-teriyaki char crust, Vidalia onion slaw, cornbread, and for dessert watermelon ices… Good heavens, with such an abbreviated menu I shall have a great deal of time on my hands this morning. Would you like me to arrange a festive centerpiece for the patio table?"

Luthor all over again. Definitely. Strutting because he thought he'd won.

"Sure," Selina said flatly. "Festive centerpiece, knock yourself out, Alfred. Just stay away from the _tu_lips; you know how Harvey was with the double entendres back in the day. Wouldn't want it to seem like we were small and petty, rubbing it in."

She marched from the morning room up to her own suite. Luthor had his moment of satisfaction, but he soon discovered that Catwoman's fee had already been transferred into an offshore account. Transferred from his personal account via his own desktop computer, in fact, approximately 4 minutes before she'd taken those disks from the wall safe.

And Alfred? Well, Alfred would be satisfied for now, and Selina could concentrate on that other war that lay ahead.

* * *

Harvey was thunderstruck by the sight before him, so much so that Alfred had to repeat his question a second time:

"Pimm's cup or lemonade, sir?"

"Oh, ah" Harvey gasped, suddenly aware of his faux pas and grasping wildly at syllables to work out some sort of answer to the question he hadn't heard. "Pimm's, by all means," he managed finally. "Wonderfully refreshing on a hot day."

"Very good, sir," Alfred said mildly, pouring the drink.

Harvey continued to stare.

"Selina, you look… stunning," he said at last.

When Bruce had extended the invitation, he jokingly said Selina would be running around in her bare feet. He wasn't far off: she was wearing some kind of flat, leather sandal, just a little strip of yellow thong between her toes (She had very pretty feet Harvey noted, then felt like a heel for noticing)… Short-shorts (With effort Harvey prevented himself from noticing the curve of her suntanned legs)… And this _t-shirt_… It was… it was… two cats! Harvey's eyes riveted on the image: two cats, one black and one tan, curled up together in a circle so that they almost formed a Yin Yang.

"Hey Harv, Earth to Harvey, Meow?" Selina was saying sweetly, squatting down to place her face in the path of his eyes. "You've seen 'the girls' before, Harvey," she teased, "and in tighter packaging than this, so what's say you reclaim your title as the one man in Gotham that can look me in the eye."

Days of tense worry exploded inside Harvey Dent's brain and he heard a rumble of powerful laughter bursting out from his belly, vibrating through his chest, and bursting out through his lips. Selina – dear, impossible, impossibly heedless, impossibly shameless Selina. The little sister he never had.

"Thanks Kitty, I needed that," he gasped when he regained his breath.

"So I gather," she said, in that same easy lighthearted way. "Haven't heard a cackle like that since the 'Joker-whoopie cushion incident' at the Berg that time."

Harvey smiled, but it was a sad smile.

"We've _– I've_ been having some dark thoughts lately," he said seriously. "Darth Duality -or the echoes at least. Two-Face is gone but… not forgotten. _But_," he paused with the practiced air of a brilliant trial attorney about to reveal the most important piece of evidence, "whatever Darth residue may remain, none of his depraved, licentious thoughts of you can withstand a performance like that. _'The girls!'_" He burst out laughing again, "Selina, you're a pistol."

"Bang, bang," she said dryly, blowing on her pointed fingertip for effect. "Come on, I'll take you outside. Bruce had to take a phonecall from Lucius Fox, wheels are coming off some business deal. He'll join us as soon as he can."

They walked together to the patio table and sat; not for an instant did Harvey register the sway of Selina's hips, nor did he blink when she crossed her legs.

* * *

Oswald was becoming very, _very_ worried.

It was one thing when three cocktail waitresses and a washroom attendant got all misty eyed and started impulsively hugging him. It was another thing entirely when women from that other side of the Iceberg's operations began acting the very same way.

He had started the weekly meeting for snitches as he always did, handing out assignments for what the "Word on the Street" was to be for the next several days.

"Organization is the key-_kwak_!" he reminded them. "Otherwise you're putting Joker in six different parts of town Thursday night."

That's when he noticed Lexxi had that same look in her eye, just like Raven and Gina and Brenda, the one that came right before "Oh _Ozzy_" and the hug!

"Ahem," he quacked for attention although no one had interrupted him, "As I was saying, organization is the key. It takes time to properly disseminate a rumor about something going down on the docks, and of course not all Rogues are prompt about turning in their work orders."

There was that look again. Lexxi had it and so did Liza and so did Magpie. Looking at him like a stuffed teddy bear, looking ready to "Oh Ozzy" and the bearhug.

"Kwak! As I was saying, kwak-eh… Yes, with proper management, we can insure that the whole of Team Bat will show up or not to any given crime. Wouldn't you know it, there are six crimes demanding immediate attention all at least 20 blocks apart, that kind of thing –kwak! But we can't have Mr. Freeze showing up at 9:30 saying 'I need Batman at my warehouse at midnight.' IS THERE SOMETHING I CAN DO FOR YOU, MISS GIANELLI?!"

"Your nose, Mr. Cobblepot, it's just so… adorable!"

Worried. Oswald Cobblepot was becoming very, very worried.

* * *

After a few minutes quiet contemplation on the patio, Selina finally spoke, quietly serious.

"So Harvey, 'Darth residue' aside, _how are you_?"

"Oh, you know, can't complain," he said modestly. "And yourself?"

"Okay I guess," she lied. The year had been difficult, with Sue Dibny's murder right in the middle of Hell Month and then the Zatanna outrage coming to light, but she couldn't allude to any of that or the toll it had taken on the family. Selina could lie convincingly, but Harvey had been a savvy prosecutor and was still her closest friend. Big brother mode subconsciously engaged.

"O-kay… you guess," he repeated raising a skeptical eyebrow.

In response, Selina gave a theatrical smile, and her tone became markedly lighter as she blithely changed the subject.

"MOMA opening last week! Guess you saw in the papers. Blake." She made a playful scratching motion that made Harvey wince in mock sympathy.

"I saw… at the Harvard Club. With Richard Flay. He's very keen for everyone to notice his quote: 'lovely evening before the uncouth ruffian showed up.' Makes it sound like Blake was using a toothpick at the buffet."

Selina smiled sweetly. "He almost used a Batarang as a toothpick at one point, but that really wasn't his idea. And I believe Talia al Ghul's shoe came into contact with his pearly whites once or twice."

Harvey's eyes shifted at this second mention of Talia's presence at the party, but he said nothing. Instead he shifted focus back to the least controversial party guest he was aware of.

"Did you have the misfortune of meeting the Flayster himself at this shindig?"

"I did," Selina nodded, sliding easily into gossip mode. "He asked Eddie out to the Hamptons to 'see his art.'"

"Riddle me that," Harvey said finally, "Well, I can see how it could happen; did you _see_ that picture of 'The New Riddler' in the Post last few months?"

"You mean the new GenX, manscaped, exfoliatedRiddler. I know. Harvey I swear, I think it's _almost_ worse than the goggles."

"No," Harvey assured her, "Selina, nothing is worse than the goggles. That creature in the tabloids looks like Bee-Woman. Although I think the texture of the catsuit itself is getting better."

"Well I'll take your word for it, Harv. I don't read the Post and I don't plan to until they get it through their thick skulls that to a girl like me 'the East End' is where you get stuck in traffic driving out to the Hamptons late Friday afternoon, and that's it."

Harvey started to chuckle.

"Oh I've got it. Let's say Eddie took Richard Flay up on his offer—"

"Eddie doesn't swing that way," Selina interrupted.

"Work with me, you'll like this," Harvey said excitedly. "The Post already gave him this godawful, metrosexual makeover. Just like what they did with Catwoman, right? Looks nothing like him, acts nothing like him – so he's heading out to the Hamptons, through East End, gets stuck in traffic, gets out of the cab to stretch his legs…"

Inside the manor, Bruce watched as the animated conversation on the patio burst into a chorus of happy laughter. Then another. Then another.

"Anagrams for 'My Beloved East End'!" Selina's voice cheered audibly through the window.

She hadn't smiled like that, laughed like that, in months. Whatever they were joking about-

"If the East End ended east of the edge where-" "-where a woodchuck would chuck wood? Time out, flag on the play, that's a tonguetwister, not a riddle." "You didn't let me finish." "Pffffft."

She seemed so carefree. It was exactly what Bruce had wanted… but now that he saw it, he didn't quite like it. He remembered that his own playboy years had been nothing more than an act, while Harvey the "Dentmeister" had been very real indeed. They once had a contest to see who could score the most with the other guy's date. Harvey won, although he didn't know it. Most of the women counted as Bruce's victories consisted of taking the young lady down to the car, letting her see the wetbar and other amenities in the back of a Rolls Royce, and then when she was suitably dazzled, suggesting Alfred drive her home while it was still early enough for all her neighbors to see. They always jumped at the chance, freeing the remainder of Bruce's evening for Batman.

Harvey's victories in this same contest, Bruce could only assume, were exactly what they appeared to be: Harvey "the Apollo" turning all his charm on some woman Bruce had brought to a party, making her laugh, making her feel special, showing her such a good time that when he suggested a quaint place down the street for a nightcap…

"_'Giggles'_ Greg Brady?" Selina gasped, "_Iceberg_ Greg Brady?"

"The one and only," Harvey answered.

"Well I guess he is handsome in that decorative henchman way," Selina admitted.

Harvey raised an eyebrow.

"There's a 'decorative henchman' way?"

She bit her lip – It was a look Bruce recognized: "How do I explain this to your limited male/crimefighter/non-cat intellect."

"Just take my word for it," she laughed, evidently giving it up as impossible in this case.

"You're thinking of Felix, aren't you," Harvey said shrewdly. "That henchman you had for the Pollington heist, looked like a young Harrison Ford. My god, we hated him!"

"_Who_ hated him, Mr. We-don't-talk-about-ourselves-in-the-plural-anymore?"

"Not the Me-and-Darth 'We'," Harvey insisted, "This was the every red-blooded male in the Iceberg 'We.' We _all_ hated your Han Solo henchman, Selina."

PsychoBat hated agreeing with rogues about anything, but Bruce remembered that henchman and he had despised him. His lip twitched faintly at the memory of a roundhouse kick that sent the guy sprawling, but the recollection was cut short by another duet of merry laughter erupting from the patio. Bruce indulged in a final bat-grunt before transforming his features into a foppish grin and heading out to greet his guest.

* * *

Oswald wasn't exactly hiding in his office. He had to get out a new issue of 'The Iceberger,' his new in-house newsletter for Iceberg employees… _"Become the Terrified Stool Pigeon: The Stanislavsky Method for Surviving a Bat Encounter intact,"_ he typed.

Something was going on with them, all of them. "Oh Ozzy" – Smother hug.

He was thinking of hosting the next theme-weapons seminar: an Umbrella Firepower demonstration perhaps, to remind everyone he was a hardened criminal.

_With the upcoming introduction of the "Stool Pigeon" package, we can expect a significant drop in Bat-Interrogations of non-stoolies, however with the drop in frequency, the intensity of interrogations will presumably— _

It was this younger generation, that was the problem. They knew him only as Oswald Cobblepot, nightclub owner. They knew nothing of the brilliant, ruthless master criminal that was The Penguin. He would have to remind them, it was time to remind them all that "Ozzy" was Oswald THE PENGUIN Cobblepot_-kwaaak-wak-wak!_

* * *

He had a protocol. Selina couldn't quite believe it, but her heart skipped a beat as she watched the scene playing out on the corner of the patio. Alfred had positioned Bruce near the grill with a spatula in his hand. It was clearly for appearances only, because the "patriarch" was supposed to run the show at a barbecue. But Alfred obviously intended to do the cooking himself and had his own spices and utensils arranged with butlery precision on a little table facing the grill.

First Bruce asked for more ice in his lemonade, and when Alfred went to bring it, Bruce repositioned the steaks over the flame.

Selina actually felt her lips part when she saw it. He had a protocol for the barbecue. Her skin warmed at the thought and her heart beat faster. Games were games and she wasn't about to stop playing them, but nothing in the history of bat/cat rooftops would have ever delivered this moment: Bruce, at home, just as he was, and he was Batman. And she loved him. There he was: Batman's mind, Batman's strategy, Batman's stubborn, plan all mapped out in advance so he could run things his way at the grill… She loved him so much.

After the ice diversion had played out, he slipped a hand casually into his pocket and turned towards the house. "That's the telephone, isn't it, Alfred?"

Alfred looked suspiciously towards the French doors, a muffled ring barely audible behind the glass.

"Perhaps Miss Selina would oblige me by going to check?" he said, reaching for the meat tongs.

Selina never got to see Lex Luthor's face when he realized Catwoman had taken her fee from his accounts before completing the job. She imagined it looked very much like Alfred's did now. He'd wanted her to be mistress of the manor, and mistress of the manor she would be.

"I'm sorry Alfred," she said sweetly. "Harvey and I haven't seen each other for months. I really can't tear myself away right now. Would you be a dear and see to it yourself?"

Alfred nodded with the good grace of a butler who has been outmaneuvered, and Selina's eyes met Bruce's for a fleeting moment before he turned back to the grill.

"Harvey?" Selina said, without taking her eyes from the figure vigorously sprinkling seasoning onto the steaks, "If lunch is inedible, it's entirely my fault."

Harvey had already noticed her expression watching Bruce, an expression he associated with talk of Cartier's, art galleries and Bat-encounters.

"You've got it bad, Kitty," he observed.

"Yes. Yes, I do," she admitted.

"I'm glad," he whispered. "He's much better for you than— Oh look, down there by the garden maze. I thought I saw something moving."

Selina recognized the maneuver. There were rules about Catwoman and Batman, rules every rogue knew and which they violated at their peril. They who hinted, alluded, or teased got scratched, clawed, or mauled. Quite often if a speaker was prattling along and caught himself about to commit a claw-able offence, he would stop mid-sentence, just as Harvey had done, and "notice" something -usually a shadow that might be a vigilante. _See that movement, right over there that looked like a cape, didn't it look like a cape? _

"I'm sure it's nothing," Selina said mildly, not even glancing towards the garden maze. "A bird maybe, or a squirrel. The grounds security is first rate, I don't see anything larger than a chipmunk getting in this far."

Harvey smiled.

"A security system you approve of? I take it that means you've made your famous adjustments to it."

"A-hem," Alfred coughed mildly from the doorway. "Might I speak to you inside for a moment, sir?"

Bruce started to object, his eye on the grill, it was almost time to flip the steaks over –but Alfred's next words hit a nerve, something in the tone…

"I am sure Miss Selina will oblige us _both_ by turning the steaks, sir. If I could speak to you _inside_ for a moment."

Bruce turned from the grill and met Alfred's eyes, a tense pulse of alarm radiating across the terrace between them.

"Okey dokey," he chirped lightly, subconsciously snapping back into an exaggerated fop.

Selina noticed the overcompensation, but buried her concern in the need to appear casual for Harvey. "Looks like we're saved, Harv," she said brightly. "Let's go rescue our lunch."

Tense moments passed while Selina chattered with determined vivacity about Richard Flay and his art collection.

"I hit it twice, once successfully, got the most beautiful Durer, and once not, bat-trouble. But it was that night I saw he had the Picasso I took from the Winthrop Collection in Boston."

"Oh dear," Harvey said faintly.

"Bev never told me who she fenced things to. Anyway that was that, can't go stealing from a customer, however roundabout."

"Eh, no, Selina I meant—"

"It's tacky."

"Selina, do shut up and turn around. I believe you have another few guests to contend with."

Selina turned, her mouth dropped open in shock –as did that of the uninvited "guest."

Ra's al Ghul stood at the edge of the garden path off the patio, his arms outstretched in a broad, welcoming gesture, his face rapt with pride and satisfaction – until the woman with dark hair turned… then he stared, uncomprehending. His astonished eyes began to flicker wildly from Selina to Harvey and back to Selina. He glanced at the centerpiece – and looked back at Selina – He looked to the French doors – and looked back at Selina – He looked at the steaks, the spices, the utensils laid out by the grill – the tongs Selina held in her hand – the very strange image on the shirt she wore – then he looked her up and down from head to toe.

"You," he said dully, his face a mask of stunned bewilderment.

"Me," Selina answered, lips pursing into a crisp expression of patient feline pity.

The French doors burst open and Bruce and Alfred stepped hurriedly back onto the patio. This gave Ra's two new people to look at, which he did in turn: first at Bruce then back at Selina… then at Alfred and back at Selina… and once again at Harvey, at the grilling steaks, and back, yet again, at Selina.

"The Det- The- That is-" he stammered, his mouth going on to form some syllable or other without any sound behind it. His eyes had stopped darting around the patio and remained now riveted on Selina, the dull bewilderment giving way to the usual intensity of the Demon Head's powerful glare. "You?" he repeated.

"Yep. Still me," she said with a nod. "We did this already. Before we go again, I'm just gonna flip these steaks over."

"What is going on here," Bruce asked tersely.

Ra's looked suspiciously at Harvey and assumed a sour expression, then he looked at Bruce helplessly. Surely the Detective must realize that in front of this guest, whoever the man was, no answer was possible – nor even a question, of which Ra's had several. Bruce glared hatefully but said nothing, so Ra's merely drew himself up proudly.

"I have brought a gift," he announced flatly. "Ubu, place the _Ata ah Ghul_ on the table."

Ubu bowed and produced a long, flat parcel. He moved the centerpiece aside – bringing even darker glares from Alfred than Ra's was receiving from Bruce – and laid the parcel on the table.

"Okay that's enough of this nonsense," the unexpected voice of Harvey Dent rang out, a startling aura of authority solidifying around him. "I'm perfectly aware what's going on here."

"Um, Harvey," Bruce began while Selina said "Harv really," Alfred murmured "Mr. Dent, I really don't think-" Ubu said nothing but calmly assumed a defensive stance and analyzed the terrace for an optimal battle position.

Harvey then performed the most unnerving double maneuver, the two sides of his body seemingly operating independent of each other: his right ushered Selina behind him as if to say _"Stand back, little lady,"_ while the left waved off Bruce with a clear air of "_Don't bother with this, Buddy. It's beneath you. Let me handle everything." _

"See here, Ghul," he pointed like an indignant prosecutor, "you sent that messenger to summon Two-Face to some job interview last year, and that was obnoxious enough. One o'clock indeed, don't think we haven't – I haven't – forgotten that little insult. But now you want to hire _Catwoman_ for something! Well, you don't just barge into a place like this with BooBoo over there. Bruce Wayne is a fine, upstanding citizen. I would introduce you but people like him don't care to know your kind. You do not go inviting yourself to his home – we've got steaks grilling here for god sake."

"I- I-," Ra's sputtered, "I wish to hire _the Feline_?!" The words were uttered in pure astonishment at the outrageous idea, but suddenly Ra's jolted with a flash of recognition. The lawyer Two-Face – one of those preposterous rogues that infested the Detective's city – wasn't there some intelligence report or other saying the man had been healed? Ra's mouth curled into a superior smile of sudden understanding, this was no random gentleman on Bruce Wayne's terrace, it was the criminal Two-Face.

Harvey Dent knew that look, knew that smile, from waiters, from store managers, from postmen, at the Harvard Club, at the liquor store, at the dry cleaners, ten times a week he saw that look and that smile. Oh, you're Two-Face! It was irritating, it was nauseating, but from sales clerks and socialites it was at least understandable. He'd learned to live with it. But from this!? This low-rent Lugosi-wannabe prick! Hell no.

Lurch started to speak; he'd gotten as far as "Ah, I begin to comprehend the nature of the situation, but—" when Harvey exploded:

"NO! No 'buts,' no 'ands,' no 'maybes!' You're leaving and you're leaving now! You're completely out of line here, Ghul. You're interrupting an otherwise perfect afternoon and all because you're too arrogant, too misguided and too stupid to realize what a horse's ass you really are. So take your trinkets, take your little man-bitch and take your 2-a-bottle dye job and get the hell out of here!"

Shocked at hearing his master so addressed, Ubu grabbed the hilt of his sword. Harvey spun on him.

"What, BooBoo? You gonna whip out that little piece of tin and go to work?" Harvey sneered in disgust. "For once, use that engorged head of yours for something more than bowing to Fu Manchu over there. A house like this? There's cameras everywhere - and cameras mean videotape evidence. Once swing and I'll have your ass brought up on assault with a deadly weapon and attempted murder. All of Heady's power and money won't protect you from the guys in Cellblock C who think that little loincloth ensemble looks _real purdy_."

At the conclusion of this astonishing tirade, Ubu and Harvey stared each other down for a full second.

Then another.

Then another.

It was Ubu who broke first, glancing to his master for instructions.

Ra's, of course, had noticed what Harvey Dent did not, that the Detective had moved into a position where Ubu wouldn't get his sword from its scabbard before being overpowered. Reluctantly he nodded, and Ubu grimly slackened from his battle-stance.

Buoyed by his victory over the minion, Harvey wheeled again on the master.

"Now then," Harvey said, calming considerably although his face was still flushed from the burst of anger. "You want to hire Catwoman for something. Why wouldn't you; she's the best. You have some little trinket you want purloined in the course of doing whatever overrated hairdos do when you're not pretending to be Batman's greatest foe."

Ra's eyes darted feebly towards the Detective's, but the man had moved from where he had been standing and Ra's found his eyes meet the manservant's instead – which were fully as pitiless as the Detective's might have been.

"You do what any civilized rogue would do, get down to the Iceberg and send a message through proper channels, and maybe if she feels like it, she'll be good enough to take your call. But I wouldn't count on it, because this was just rude. Very idea, showing up at a place like Wayne Manor –you owe Bruce an apology, you overhyped goatherd."

Before Harvey Dent could proceed with this monstrous suggestion, Ra's al Ghul drew himself up with the cold hauteur of one who has ruled for a thousand lifetimes.

"The privilege you have all enjoyed, basking in the Demon Head's Illustrious Presence, is now at an end," he declared imperiously.

Ubu reached to retrieve the package, but Harvey bellowed "LEAVE THAT!" with such ferocity that Ra's felt it best to sacrifice the package, temporarily, rather than prolong this interminable misadventure.

"Keep to the path on your way out," Harvey called, "Don't let BooBoo go trampling the flower beds."

An edgy silence enveloped the patio as Bruce, Selina, Harvey and Alfred watched Ra's and Ubu walk down the garden path and disappear finally over the horizon.

The moment held.

Nobody moved.

Nobody spoke.

Until Selina blithely sniffed the air and glanced at the grill.

"The steaks are burning…" she said.

* * *

…to be continued…


	4. March of the Penguin

**Napoleon's Plan**  
_Chapter 4: March of the Penguin_

* * *

A pensive silence lingered on the Wayne Manor patio after Ra's al Ghul's humbled exit. Bruce, Selina and Alfred were all recalling the astonishing scene that just played out, while Harvey, indignant but energized by the confrontation, eyed the food.

Alfred quickly noticed and, holding the comfort of the guest as the prime consideration, he made an effort to coerce Bruce and Selina back into the "cookout" spirit with a theatrical return to the grill. He began "plating" the steaks, arranging each artfully amidst a garnish and sides, creating the effect of a gourmet restaurant rather than a casual, afternoon cookout – and he thought he succeeded in baiting Bruce with this maneuver when he felt that light tap on his elbow. Bruce was indeed pulling him aside, but his purpose had nothing to do with the barbecue.

"Got to admit, Alfred, I'm torn," he began. "'Of two minds,' as our friend Two-Face used to say. Dent's tirade against Ra's, it was very… _'Face.' _But when it came down to threats, it wasn't about ripping out his entrails and dividing them into two even piles. It was sending him to _jail_; it was pure Harvey Dent. Anxious as I am to go after Ra's, I don't know if I can leave right now – might be more important to stay here, keep an eye on this."

"Eh-yes, there is that consideration _of course_, Master Bruce, as well as…"

"I know, I know. As D.A. Harvey had direct contact with Batman, and as Two-Face he saw even more. I really need to be careful where he's concerned. To up and disappear on a trumped up excuse right now would be dangerous."

"Well yes, and of course it would be _rude_, sir."

Bruce glared.

* * *

Ubu jostled, yet again, with the doorman at the Gotham Imperial Hotel. The man had opened the door as he would for any guest when Ra's al Ghul approached the front entrance to the grand hotel. But Ubu recognized the high forehead and double chin cleft indicative of the Bughinsae Clan of the lowlands. He would not let Ra's pass through the door while this man held it, for that would expose his master's back to the cunning mercenary. Ubu himself would hold the door while Ra's passed through, and then he himself would pass. Then _and only then_ could the wily Bughinsae return to his post.

The commotion had not died down when Ra's came back to the doors, displeased with his reception at the front desk, and the Bughinsae doorman again tried to hold the door for him. Ra's stood at the entrance inside the plush lobby while Ubu resumed his fracas with the doorman. Ra's fumed, he paced, and then finally just as Ubu had reestablished the procedure by which the door would be opened for the Demon's Head, Ra's resigned himself to the new disgrace and returned to the front desk, leaving Ubu holding the door for nobody and the doorman smirking.

Ubu cared nothing for the Bughinsae's derision and followed Ra's back to the front desk.

* * *

Bruce might have been "of two minds" after witnessing Harvey Dent's face-off with Ra's al Ghul, but Harvey himself felt less conflicted than he had in years. He had one thought only: he was hungry. He poked at the charred crust of his steak and declared it "a little singed, but nothing to declare a hunger strike over." To prove the point, he cut a bite, popped it into his mouth, and chewed happily.

"Come on," he told Bruce and Selina, "not going to let Mr. Dead and Loving It wreck a beautiful afternoon. Selina! Where's the famous cat-curiosity, open up Lurch's gift. Let's see what the calcified old coot thinks is a tempting inducement for the Queen of Cats?"

"Oh," Selina hedged, looking warily at the package, "I really don't think- I mean, since I'm not going to take the job, better to just send it back unopened, don't you think?"

"Open it!" Harvey cajoled, "I insist. Dying to see what's in there, and it's the least you can do when I booted him off for you."

Selina glanced sideways at Bruce. His casual Saturday-at-home posture hadn't changed but Batman's ferocious intensity burned in his eyes. He met her gaze and his head shifted ever so slightly in a sideways "No" motion. Selina's lip curled into the playful grin.

"I am curious," she purred, dipping into Catwoman's sultriest tones. "If he invited Two-Face to a one o'clock sit-down, I can only imagine he's given me a dog collar."

Before Bruce could suggest that Alfred take the package inside to be opened with a mail knife, Selina had taken it into her lap and ripped off the paper, revealing a flat ebony box carved with a 5-clawed talon in a central oval, the placement if not the image echoing the bat-emblem. Selina arched an eyebrow but made no comment, remembering that whatever this "gift" was, it was only Harvey's misreading of the situation that suggested it was meant for her. Ra's presumably brought it for Batman. She undid the latch and impulsively lifted the lid.

"Swords," she declared, amused but bewildered. Then she looked up at Bruce, "Look Honey! He gave me swords," she repeated.

* * *

The Dragon Blades. The Detective's Feline concubine in possession of the Dragon Blades. Of all the affronts he had suffered on this accursed day in this accursed city, that was the worst. He had been addressed as "Ghul." He had been called an overrated hairdo, an overhyped goatherd, and a horse's ass. His personal attendant had been referred to as his "man-bitch." And now he found himself not in his accustomed quarters in the Gotham Imperial Hotel but in the _Honeymoon_ Suite, sitting on a bed strewn with rose petals, confetti, and small white pellets which turned out to be candied mints. But of all these mortifications, the thought of a woman – of _that_ woman most especially – handling his brother's sword, handling his own, it was grotesque.

Absently, he picked one of the small, white buttermints off the bedspread and snapped it between his teeth.

On his previous visits to Gotham, he had always made prior arrangements with the Imperial Hotel to reserve the Royal Suite for himself and the top three floors for his entourage. He hadn't even _brought_ an entourage this time, assuming he would be invited to sleep at the manor, of which his daughter was so soon to be mistress. He had not wanted to inflict his usual train of 80 followers on Wayne Manor, feeling the Detective might look on this copious honor as more of an invasion. So he had exercised restraint, assuming Gr'oriBr'di would supply a suitable honor guard as soon as he was informed of the glad tidings.

But now – (_What was the Feline doing in Bruce Wayne's home?_) – Now he found he had to obtain lodging and the impudent slave at the front desk informed him that the Royal Suite was "currently occupied." The effrontery. Occupied! By one Count Adam Gottlob Charles von Moltke-Huitfeld, no less. "A descendent of Napoleon Bonaparte," the miserable slave informed him.

Descendent of Napoleon Bonaparte indeed, he was no such thing, Ra's al Ghul was certain of that. He _could_ be related to Napoleon's brother Jerome, Ra's supposed. Jerome Bonaparte had married some American (Ra's did not bother noting her name as she was a woman, but he recalled that she was the granddaughter of Daniel Webster). Not that any of that mattered. What mattered was that the slave refused to evict this powerless nobody to make way for Ra's al Ghul - light of the east, terror of the west; Anointed of Anubis and Osiris, Chosen of Ra; apex of the age of Oneness through One Rule by the most worthy Demon's Head – and an inbred cousin of Napoleon had his room!

Still, as much as it chafed his Imperial Pride, Ra's quickly realized he could not waste time scouring the city for accommodations befitting his rank. He had fallen victim to faulty intelligence or else he had fallen victim to a dire plot, and he could not find out too soon what was really going on.

* * *

"What an idiot," Harvey exclaimed, munching the last piece of cornbread. "_Swords?!_ He gave you two swords – TWO swords mind you. Two-Face he asks for a 1 o'clock meeting, you he gives a pair of swords. I shouldn't have sent him to the Iceberg, I should have taken him there myself by way of 57th Street. Show him what kind of trinkets you buy a lady before you ask for something. Bruce knows what I'm getting at, don't you buddy."

It was Bruce's turn to raise an eyebrow. He remembered "Apollo" Dent's routine too well from their playboy days: a silk scarf at the beginning of the affair, a wrist watch at the end.

"They're very nice swords," Selina pointed out. "Look at that, little dragons carved into the hilt, beautiful work there, that leather tied around the sheath, look at the patina on that… Light too. Beautifully balanced." She pulled one out, which caused Bruce to step back in alarm – entirely for Fop considerations he told himself, although his Bat-half was none too thrilled at the sight of Catwoman wielding Ra's al Ghul's sword that way.

"Oh don't tell me you can fence too," Harvey wailed, helping himself to a watermelon ice.

"Not fencing." Selina said, executing a slow graceful move then sheathing the sword. "Just a few kata. My sensei was very big on the fundamentals."

Bruce placed a mental checkmark next to that kernel of information about Catwoman's training. His inner Bat grunted at the confirmation of a long-suspected theory. The rest of him continued to look alarmed at the sight of his girlfriend _wielding Ra's al Ghul's sword_.

* * *

Ra's al Ghul marshaled the facts, as they were known.

The German composer Richard Wagner took all the glorious dragon lore with which Ra's had primed him and produced Fafner, a _Westerner's_ idea of a dragon: he did nothing more than guard a hoard of treasure he had no use for _–until the hero lured him from his home, hid like a coward under a rock, and stabbed him in the belly._ Ra's had been thinking of the story in the course of his pre-dip meditations. That was how Westerners viewed the dragon, a stupid beast to be lured away from its home by a hero's cunning, lured away from his power base, into ambush and death.

He _had_ been lured away – he, Ra's al Ghul, the living dragon, had been lured from his home into Gotham City, into the very _heart_ of his enemy's power, lured by the most tempting bait of all… It was surely the most fiendishly brilliant plan the Detective had ever devised. Never in their long battle had the man so distinguished himself as one most fit to sire the next DEMON – and indeed most suited to lead the organization if Ra's himself were to expire before his grandson was of age to…

Oh dear.

Oh dear.

That possibility had not occurred to him before: the very qualities that made the Detective so suitable to sit at his right hand made it quite unlikely he would be content to do so. The Detective was, afterall – GOOD LORD, WHY HAD HE NOT CONSIDERED THIS BEFORE – the Detective _was his enemy! _ If Ra's were to welcome him into the bosom of his family, how long would it be before he welcomed that Dragon Blade to his bosom as well!

Perhaps it was fortunate that the relationship with Talia was not quite so far along as Gr'oriBr'di had led Ra's to believe, it gave Ra's time to…

Gr'oriBr'di.

_It was Gr'oriBr'di_ who led Ra's to believe The Detective had finally accepted his destiny with Talia. It was Gr'oriBr'di who was the source of that false intelligence. What if he had not been deceived by an elaborate ruse of the Detective's but _was himself the originator of the plot?_

What if it was Gr'oriBr'di who lured Ra's from his home into the heart of his enemy's power!

The Detective had seemed downright astonished at Ra's arrival. He was performing, of course, for the benefit of the Infidel Harvey Dent, but as Ra's thought back, he did seem to glean marks of _true surprise_ in the Detective's bearing. What if he knew nothing of it? What if… What if… What if…

"Ubu," Ra's called thoughtfully, "We are in need of new intelligence, reliable new intelligence. Make inquiries, and learn the location of this 'Iceberg' of which the infidel Harvey Dent spoke."

* * *

Oswald emerged from his office with a crazed gleam in his eye. He had not yet determined why the women of the Iceberg were fawning over him with such featherbrained devotion, but he would! Oh yes he would. And in the meantime, he would demonstrate to all the world that Oswald The Penguin Cobblepot was a figure to be feared, not cooed after.

He said as much to Sly when he checked the bartender's receipts just now, and what Jonathan Crane found so amusing about that Oswald meant to find out as well. The looks back and forth between Crane and Sly, if Scarecrow had any thoughts of stealing his bartender then he too would soon learn what it was to cross Oswald Cobblepot.

He had already secured a quantity of venom and the penguins would be arriving soon, then they would see who was "an adorable Ozzy-Wozzy," then they would learn what a theme criminal really was.

These pleasant musings had been interrupted by Sparrow's timid knock. Sly needed him, she said, a new customer wanted to run a tab. So he emerged from his office, eyes glistening with dreams of the terror his name would instill once more in hero and rogue alike – when his eye fell on this "new customer." Oswald marched right up to the man, who was entirely too tall, and when Oswald got close enough for the effect he wished, he had to tilt his head upward. He did it belligerently, but the move brought more of that damnable cooing from half the women in the bar.

"KWAK-kwakka-quakka-kwa," he yelled at them, which silenced the coos but brought more tender smiles. "Your name?" Oswald asked, though he knew full well, it pleased him to question a new applicant.

"Ra's al Ghul," the man announced pointedly.

"That how you pronounce it?" Oswald grumbled. "Okay Sly, he looks good for it. Open a new account under Brady."

Ra's eyes bulged. "Gr'oriBr'di?" he asked, incredulous.

"Gregory Brady," Oswald corrected. "Which reminds me, when you see him, tell him his men aren't nearly so prompt paying their tabs as those Ghost Dragons. He really might want to have that talk with them about the honor of settling their debts."

"Gr'oriBr'di's men frequent this establishment?" Ra's asked, stunned.

"Hey Sly, gimme a Demon's Head and a bowl of peanuts," someone called down the bar. Ra's head snapped in that direction. To his horror, he saw a bowl of peanuts passed to an unseemly looking individual along with a tall glass full of a syrupy red liquid topped with an inch of pink froth and a strawberry.

Ra's pointed in amazement as he turned back to Oswald, but he couldn't think how to even phrase the question, so he merely repeated: "Gr'oriBr'di's men frequent this establishment?"

"'Course they do, where else would they go. Best bar in Gotham," a new voice sang out. Ra's was horrified to note it was a woman's voice. Women permitted in the tavern to socialize with the men. There was no end to Western depravity. "The usual, Sly," the creature ordered.

"Sure thing, Gorgeous," the bartender winked.

"Your serving man takes orders from women?" Ra's asked Oswald.

The only answer was a vicious snapping kwak, and Oswald waddled back to his office – evoking another round of delighted cooing from the waitresses.

"Don't mind him," a strange little fellow said, taking his drink from the bar and pushing between Ra's and Ubu to make his way to his table. "Ozzy will never accept that Sly and Roxy Rocket are meant to be together and he just doesn't figure into the equation."

Ra's and Ubu looked at each other sharply.

"My Lord," Ubu said, his voice hoarse with shock. "'Roxy Rocket,' 'Iceberg,' You don't think…"

Ra's glared hatefully back at his minion. No one knew the mechanisms by which Gr'oriBr'di broke the wills of men, they knew only that minions who returned from Gotham kept to themselves, whispering of "the rocket" and "ice burrows." It seemed incredible but- but—

"We need reliable intelligence, Ubu," Ra's repeated his words from the hotel as he stared, spellbound, at the strange little man retreating into the crowd. Ra's followed after him like a man in a trance, and Ubu followed, as always, after his master.

* * *

Although Selina was Harvey's closest friend in the Wayne household, he edged closer to Bruce as the couple walked him to the door. Selina took the hint, and let Bruce escort Harvey the rest of the way to his car.

"It's good to see you two together," Harvey said once they were alone. "You seem to fit each other really well. I think it's great that you two found each other and have stayed together for so long. Selina's a good catch and it looks like it's going swimmingly for you both. I'm really glad of that."

Bruce smiled and waited, sensing there was more to come and thinking it might be a threat along the lines of: _Hurt her and I'll break both your arms in two places._ Harvey did have more to say, but it came from a completely different direction than Bruce expected:

"Look Buddy, I know making a relationship like this work is no easy feat and I want you to know that I'm with you on this one. If you ever have any problems with –ahem– anyone in a cape, you just let me know. 'We' know how to handle that jackass."

Bruce tried to look grateful.

* * *

Mindful of his dignity, Ra's al Ghul had appropriated a table in the rear corner of the Iceberg dining room and had Ubu bring the strange little man to him rather than demeaning himself by going to a Gotham "rogue" for information.

Jonathan Crane couldn't hear the conversation, but he noted the giant Ubu hovering over Jervis's table, clearly trying to intimidate the smaller, weaker man… Just like a bully, just like all of that sort: all muscle and no brains, they thought they could get away with anything… Look at that, Jervis going along with the big brute because what else could he do? Crane inhaled sharply, an almost sexual excitement seizing him… Bullies dealt in Fear. And Fear turned back on them was the most satisfying revenge of all!

"I am Ra's al Ghul," Ra's said simply when Jervis Tetch reached his table.

"Be what you would seem to be," Jervis twittered in reply. "Or, if you'd like it put more simply - never imagine yourself not to be otherwise than what it might appear to others that what you were or might have been was not otherwise than what you had been would have appeared to them to be otherwise."

Ra's blinked.

"I have spoken your language for many centuries," he said slowly, "and I believe I am most fluent in vocabulary, syntax, and idiom. Nevertheless, your words befuddle me. Speak more plainly, or I shall have Ubu thrash you."

"I think I could, if I only knew how to begin," Jervis answered. "For, you see, so many out-of-the-way things have happened lately. What's an Ubu?"

"Ubu is my bodyguard and manservant. You may ignore him, for he is a serf of no importance, unless you displease me, in which case he shall act merely as an instrument of my will and thrash you."

Jervis squinted. "What size hat does he wear?"

* * *

Talia arrived home – to her new "home" anyway – at least it was only one roommate this time. She didn't care for the idea of sharing lodging, but the city was so expensive, it seemed the way all the peasants lived here. The waitress Mia, from that diner, was good enough to take her in at first when she learned of Talia's plight:

Yes, she _could_ pay for her meal, technically; she had a credit card with literally no spending limit whatsoever. She could buy her meal, buy the diner, buy the entire city block with it. But if she used that card, Talia explained tearfully, her father would know at once. He would know that she needed him. He would know where to find her. She couldn't face that, she couldn't!!

She had a six thousand dollar watch, here, she told Mia, she could have it. Just let her eat here without paying. Mia had nodded and sat down next to her. "What's his name?" she asked shrewdly.

"M- My father?" Talia had sobbed.

"No, fathers are all alike. Come in a diner at one in the morning, sobbing, no cash, order a big hunka pie, there's always a 'he' behind it all, and it's not Daddy."

Talia burst into tears, and six soggy napkins later it was settled: Mia would take the watch and Talia could come home with her and "crash" at her place as long as she wanted. Mia already had 2 roommates; rent was 2,000 a month, that meant the watch covered her share for a year. Mia would even speak to the manager about giving Talia a job…

That part didn't work out; Talia hadn't lasted a week. But she had a nametag reading "Tee" which she kept for reasons she didn't really understand. It's not like those four endless days in awful, cheap shoes, bringing troglodytes coffee and hamburgers, was a rewarding experience that she wished to remember. But she kept that nametag. It was in her pocket even now, like a good luck charm. "Tee" …Greg's name for her. The woman she should have been, wanted to be, glimpsed for a few brief seconds before it all went to pieces.

She felt hungry and went to the kitchen. Unlike Mia, her new roommate didn't have a refrigerator full of leftovers from a diner. There was fried chicken, cold Thai pad noodles, an apple, and half a box of Krispy Kremes. She decided on the latter.

* * *

It was not going well. Ra's had given up trying to question Jervis Tetch and sent Ubu to obtain a better source of information. He did not trouble himself to learn the particulars of the entire Gothamite rabble, but he certainly remembered the reports about the plant-woman Poison Ivy, who wanted to exterminate mankind so vegetation could rule. It was a noble goal, not incompatible with much of DEMON's philosophy and mission. If she were not a woman, Ra's would have considered calling her to his service. Being a woman, she was certainly not suitable for such an honor, but she was at least memorable where so much of this criminal scum was not. So when he saw the booth cordoned off by a curtain of plant life, Ra's felt sure that must be she. Poison Ivy would not do as an ally, but she would do for an informant. He sent Ubu to summon her… that was half an hour ago.

Ra's had seen the curtain of foliage part, he had seen Ubu withdraw inside as into the flap of a tent, and he waited… waited… waited… but no Ubu emerged. Nor did Poison Ivy. And twice the serving wench had come around telling Ra's he must "order another round" or vacate his table.

"It's the oldest story in the world," Mad Hatter prattled on, oblivious to his listener's plight. "1) Mutant bird/plant/whatever killed/destroyed by would-be victim. 2) Oswald/Pammy/whoever blames would-be victim. 3) Denial ensues. 4) More SmileX threatened. 5) Bigger mutant bird/plants threatened. A pool of tears, a pool of tears, Alice drowning in a pool of tears. More tea?"

"I am not drinking tea," Ra's hissed through clenched teeth.

"More for me then!" Jervis twittered happily. "He's never coming back, don't you know. Your large friend with the pointy stick. Once they disappear in the greenery, they're gone for the week. Pammy doesn't like you demon-guys very much. Ooh look, they've brought us gooseberry jam with our bread and butter."

Ra's pressed his fingers to his brow, squeezing the flesh just above his nose, while Jervis proceeded to slather invisible jam on an imaginary slice of bread.

"Cally-oo Cally-yay, I was about to say, Pammy, Poison Ivy that is, she does have a grudge against you demon fellows always hanging around the 'Berg. Once they've had a few, the sabers come out, don't you know, and then it's all 'who can slash a leaf off the climbing clematis from here, double or nothing if you hit it without nipping the peony blossom.'" He sighed dramatically. "Men, don't you know, they don't need to give her a _reason_ to loathe them, but they do anyway."

"You are a madman," Ra's declared finally. "Take yourself from my presence and, I pray you, present yourself at the nearest institution for the care of the mentally disturbed. They will feed you and look after you until such time as the world is united under DEMON rule, when you will be humanely exterminated for the good of the species."

"You're a Capricorn, aren't you?" Jervis asked.

* * *

Selina watched from the bedroom window while Harvey Dent's car disappeared out the front gate. She was already changed into costume but figured Bruce would still beat her to the cave. Starting on the ground floor, he was probably at the clock already. If she didn't hustle, he'd be gone and she'd miss her chance to get in on Demon Hunt '05.

So she ran to the grandfather clock, ran to the cave, and was headed straight for the Batmobile when she saw there was no need to rush: he hadn't suited up completely. Omitting the mask, cape, and gloves meant he wasn't leaving any time soon. He had the tapes from the security cameras playing on all the computer screens but one. The largest monitor displayed Oracle's hologram, along with several radar screens and satellite photos.

"Sorry, Boss," The Oracle head intoned in Barbara's voice, "Now that we've tagged the plane, we'll spot it next time."

"There won't be a next time," Batman growled. "He won't use that plane again. He won't use that flight path; he probably won't use the same departure point. You'll have to expand the methodology. Get the satellite photos for the base in Nepal, go 2 to 12 hours prior to departure. Then check the records for the castle in Romania last year, and wherever he left from that other time. There has to be some SOP for his minions before he leaves to-" he broke off and turned to Selina. "Third time, can you believe it? He's in Gotham again."

"I know, I was upstairs, remember?" she said with a smile. "He gave me swords."

Batman grunted.

"I know I'm tempting fate asking," she added, "But why haven't you gone supernova about his getting past my security on the grounds?"

"My doing," he noted. "With Dent coming over, I had turned off the advanced defences. I figured if we walked down to the tennis court, I didn't want to explain why we have crystalline radiation sensors, K-metal lasers, and a gravity displacement detector."

Selina glanced up at the monitor where Oracle, chafing at Batman's earlier criticism and having overheard the conversation, was providing the explanation through a series of images. Selina decided to ignore the diagrams of kryptonite isotopes and solar radiation flickering behind his head, and returned the conversation to a more pertinent topic:

"Speaking of the swords, any idea what that was about?"

"They looked ceremonial," he said casually, not turning his attention from his calculations, "Most of DEMON is steeped in rites and rituals."

"Yeah," Selina put in, "the kind of ritual I get from Whiskers every autumn: I have the honor to present you with this mostly-dead chipmunk. No thanks."

He paused and looked up. His eyes flickered over the catsuit, then he turned back to the computer screen. Selina had often seen the 'density shift' when Bruce, in costume or not, segued into Bat-mode. What she saw now was the opposite: despite the costume, Batman suddenly… _shifted_… all that intensity dropped away like the wind from a sail. "I take it _Catwoman_ is going out to prowl?" he asked in Bruce's voice.

"I assumed I was in on this," she said uncomfortably. "Is that a problem? I mean, I thought we'd be out there looking for him tonight. To tell the truth, I figured you'd be halfway out the door by the time I got down here. Why aren't you, anyway?"

He paused. When he resumed, although the density never shifted back, he spoke in Batman's voice again.

"Where would I look? The only way to find him is to find out what he's doing here, and it _is_ a problem if you're 'in' on that. I have to contact Brady and—"

"And the spawn is going to be mentioned. I get it," she sighed. "I'll be in the way… Guess it will be a boring old prowl after all." She paused and offered a naughty pout. "Poor kitty," she said, pausing again before the pout morphed into a naughty grin. "Guess I'll have to find a way to amuse myself," she purred, eyes dancing, before adding, "…in the new lair you haven't been able to find."

* * *

As so often happened with Jervis Tetch, once his crazy had run its course, he became perfectly lucid. Having concluded his mad tea party with Ra's al Ghul, he began looking around the room like an experienced gossipmonger. He pointed out the arrival of a large crate. "Emperor Penguins," he confided, as the delivery was maneuvered through the dining room and into Oswald's office. "That won't end well."

"Because the owner of this establishment calls himself Penguin?" Ra's guessed, trying to adapt to the logic of the place.

Jervis shook his head. "The owner of this establishment is unaware of the surprise hit movie of the summer called _March of the Penguins_. Lots of cute, fuzzy, baby birds waddling on the ice and who knows what all. Every henchwench in town has seen it; they come back all girly about the adorable little beaks, and what good fathers the males are. It's revolting!"

"And Cobblepot is unaware?" Ra's asked.

"Hasn't a clue. And all the fuss spooked him, and that's when Scarecrow went to work. He can smell fear can our boy Jonathan, and there's nothing he enjoys more than feeding it once it gets going."

"I don't understand; why would he do this?"

"Oh it's just a little payback for 900 in alibi surcharges. You're new here, you'll find out about those. Rogues go over their bar tabs like other people do the phone bill. 3-1/2 hours to Peru?"

"I see."

"Grapevine has it it's working, Ozzy is ready to snap. One of those grand gestures that make life a living hell around here. That's why I'm betting it's live penguins in that crate."

"A gesture?"

"Right. Like the time he tried to take us all hostage because Sly and that Greg Brady took over his operation."

Ra's felt a curious palpitation in his chest, as if his heart had skipped a beat.

"G- G- Brady?" he managed weakly.

"Thing with venom penguins, though, that's a pretty ungainly bird to start with. With muscles I imagine they'll fall over."

"Greg Brady tried to take over Cobblepot's empire?" Ra's gasped.

"Well, maybe some of them can jump. Get you with a vicious flying peck."

"Greg Brady tried to take over the Iceberg," Ra's stated again.

"Little ones can jump small crevasses to get where they're going."

"Gr'oriBr'di usurped his previous boss's empire before coming to DEMON."

"But mostly I think they're just going to fall down."

* * *

Batman waited for Greg Brady at the rendezvous point while PsychoBat railed against the presumption of villains who had learned his identity. Ra's al Ghul trotting right up to his front door with a pair of ceremonial swords like a covered dish for the barbecue – Ra's al Ghul walking right up – it was worse than Nigma sending that cat to the house – and then the final insult, Catwoman gets to come right down to the cave, shoot a naughty grin at him, and announce she's got a new lair.

Sure, it was ridiculous grouping her with the others, she was no Riddler or Hugo Strange or Ra's al Ghul… but she wasn't exactly the girl next door either; she was a criminal once. It's how they came together in the first place, and it was that history at the heart of their new… games. Riddler at least sent his clues and taunts to the Batsignal. Catwoman could now march right down to the cave, tap him on the shoulder and say-

"Hey Bats, what's shakin'?" Greg Brady announced.

"You're late," PsychoBat growled, then Batman softened the harshness of the greeting by asking, "Any difficulty getting away, with Ra's al Ghul being in Gotham in person?"

Greg stared.

"The old man's in town?" he asked.

"You didn't know?"

"First I've heard of it," Greg shrugged.

"You're sure?"

"Yes," Greg said firmly. "I'm sure that I didn't know he was coming into Gotham. Would've mentioned a bulletin like that."

Batman grunted.

Greg grunted.

Batman glared at him.

Greg shrugged again. Then, after a tense pause, he asked, "You wouldn't happen to know where Talia's at, would you, Dude? I mean, not that I _care_ or anything, just that she's kind of a mess with the lifeskills and I'd kinda like to know she landed on her feet."

Batman shook his head no. "No idea," he said.

"Thing is, Bats, for the life of me I can't figure out how she's gonna live. I mean, you gotta admit it's not much of a resume: Father's chattel, washed out of assassin training camp, appointed head of the assassins' league anyway thanks to nepotism, obsesses on loser crimefighter (no offense, dude), stalks loser crimefighter, wrecks un-wreckable supercorp. _What_ is she going to do to eat and pay rent now, teach aerobics at the Y?"

"I don't know where she is," Batman said firmly. He noted that, whatever Brady might say, he seemed to care very much what happened to Talia. He noted too that Ra's presence in Gotham was still unexplained – and that Ra's had not told this particular minion, who _headed_ the Gotham City operations, that he was coming.

"Your stint as a mole inside DEMON is over," Batman said brusquely, "You have to disappear and I mean now, tonight—"

"No way, Dude," Greg interrupted before Batman could add "—if you want to stay alive."

Greg Brady glared defiantly at Batman.

Batman glared insistently back at Greg Brady.

Greg's knuckles tightened subconsciously as he considered making a fist.

Batman noticed the subtle clenching of muscles above the elbow and echoed it.

Their eyes locked in malevolent agreement for a silent beat and then…

A silly electronic trill broke the silence.

Batman's withering glare faltered, but only for a split second. Greg's collapsed into an embarrassed frown as the trill sounded again.

"'Scuse me," he murmured, unclipping a phone from his belt and turning away.

Batman retreated to the Batmobile and opened the OraCom. He instructed Oracle to initiate "the GB Protocol" to equip Brady with a new identity far from Gotham.

Then he hesitated, watching the man as he talked on the phone. The protocol was established when Brady first agreed to remain in DEMON as an undercover agent of the Bat. He'd been a Joker henchman and a bouncer at the Iceberg, and Batman had, perhaps, been a bit stingy with the seed money. But now… now Greg Brady might very well be the man who got Talia al Ghul out of his life for good. He told Oracle to add an additional 25,000 to the bank account.

"Bats!" Greg blurted, running after him, waving his arms as if he was afraid Batman was driving away. Batman waited while Brady caught up to him.

"I found the old man," he panted. "That was Oswald… down at the 'Berg… wants me to send someone… to pick up _Ubu!_… It's closing time and he's passed out in booth six and… well from the sound of it… 3 "Demon's Heads" –that's like 12 ounces of rum, Ivy pheromones, fear toxin, and wearing a Donald Duck hat.

* * *

…to be continued…


	5. Crimefighters Don't Knock

_Chapter 5: Crimefighters don't knock_

* * *

Nothing about Batman and Catwoman was "normal." They weren't normal as criminal and crimefighter, they weren't normal as lovers, and if there was a norm for criminals and crimefighters who then became lovers but sometime later resumed playful games harkening back to their adversarial relationship, they were about to shatter that one as well.

That was Batman's thought as he clenched his gloved knuckles into a fist and rapped them in a sharp bell-ringing motion against the door of the new Cat Lair. After a minute passed with no answer, he shot a "stay put" warning towards the waiting car and moved to the window, repeating the procedure. This time he was rewarded with a high-pitched metallic whine as a camera turned overhead. He looked up, glared into it, and waited.

After another minute, Catwoman appeared on the other side of the window, pressing her body against the glass.

"Well this is new," she mouthed distinctly, "You knocked."

He shook his head and pointed towards the door.

"No games. Open up. Now," he mouthed back.

She stuck out her tongue.

"Make me," she teased.

"No, I mean 'No games.' Open up now."

He pointed again, and Catwoman shifted behind the glass, trying to see in the direction he was pointing. Unable to glean much from her vantage point, she gave a final wink and withdrew from the window.

Batman returned to the front door and signaled the waiting car. The door opened and Greg Brady emerged, straining to pull Ubu's enormous bulk from the back seat. Batman was about to go help when an audible tone indicated the lair's perimeter defenses were disengaged and the door opened. He braced himself for an onslaught of amused felinity.

"Hey handsome, long time no grunt—what in the HELL!" she blurted, eyes wide as she saw Greg Brady lumbering towards her as he tried to maneuver Ubu's considerable deadweight through the door. "Um…" She pointed and swallowed. "Where will I put it, and how much does it eat?"

"Get him inside," Batman ordered, turning from Catwoman to Brady and back to Catwoman, "We need a safe house," he explained pushing her back inside the door. "Then get that car moved around back," he told Brady. "And this is literally the last place anyone from DEMON will look," he told Catwoman.

* * *

Ra's returned alone to the Gotham Imperial Hotel, unable to share Jervis Tetch's eager anticipation of "roid rage penguins." They were all insane, of course; Ra's knew that before setting foot in Gotham City, but nonetheless, to actually experience the madness first hand was a shock. And to face one of the massacres they considered excitement, to face it without a single guard or attendant, it was not to be borne. If Ra's al Ghul was to meet his end in the Detective's city, it would be on point of his own Dragon Blade, even if it was that accursed Feline who drove it through his bowels, but it would NOT be at the hands of a "roid rage penguin" while his own Ubu stood by, enthralled by a plant-woman!

Not knowing how to retrieve his bodyguard from the ropes of vinery draped over him, Ra's had returned to the hotel and sat once again on the bed. It had been turned down in his absence, with even more rose petals strewn through the sheets and a chocolate swan resting on the pillow.

Greg Brady had tried to usurp his former Liege Lord, the Penguin. He tried to take over the Iceberg's vast network of criminal operations for himself. There was no end to the man's villainy and ambition –which Ra's would normally applaud in a _tenant al ghul_ but now… Greg Brady controlled Ra's men in Gotham City and had done for many months. The men he had led were now interspersed throughout DEMON, in a dozen posts in the Americas and throughout the world. There was no telling who was still loyal and who, if allowed to get close enough, would plunge their dagger into Ra's al Guhl's heart and hail Greg Brady the new Demon's Head!

Ra's bit the head off the chocolate swan as a course of action suggested itself… Yes, it was a desperate move, but these were desperate times. Separated as he was from the sole minion of whom he could be absolutely certain… Yes, Yes it might work. It would work. He had been in dire circumstances before, and he would triumph over this one. If only he could locate Talia.

* * *

Catwoman deftly moved an ice bucket out of the way so Brady and Batman could maneuver Ubu's unconscious bulk onto her sofa without knocking it over. She had equipped this particular Cat Lair with a large, wide sofa, but not with this end in mind. Noting the 300 pounds of snoring DEMON bodyguard now laid out on it (and in fact spilling over the one side), she considered burning it – if not the entire lair – when this miserable episode was over.

"Think that's as stable as he's gonna get," Greg said finally, nodding with satisfaction at a job well done. Then he turned to Catwoman, like a henchman who had done this a few dozen times before. "What kinda chains you got around here?"

"uuum," Catwoman winced, "Excuse me?"

"Chains, wrist restraints, ankle cuffs, whatcha got?"

Catwoman made a face and shot Batman a look.

"Why are you guys here again?" she asked pointedly.

"How about plain rope?" Brady suggested.

"I'll explain," Batman growled. "Brady, move the car around back."

Greg Brady offered a cheery salute, like a man used to gamely taking orders whether they made sense to him or not. "Sure thing, Dude," he chirped. "An' I'll look if there's jumper cables in the trunk. Can always hog tie'em with jumper cable. I'm used to improvising, y'know, from the Ha-Hacienda. Situations like this, Mr. Joker had some 'unrealistic expectations' about Silly Putty."

As soon as Greg was gone, Batman pulled Catwoman into the next room.

"Ubu is six different kinds of unconscious right now," he said softly. "But I still don't want anybody talking in front of him. If he hears anything compromising, even subconsciously—"

Catwoman looked intrigued.

"What can he hear that Ra's doesn't already know?" she asked, a quietly excited purr.

Batman noted her excitement and glared, for the hundredth time, at her unfathomable ideas of "fun."

"Brady's cover is blown," he said in a forceful whisper. "At least it's… likely that it's blown. I need to get him out of Gotham, away from Demon, and into a new identity. He doesn't want to go. My guess is what he really means is that he doesn't want to go _without her_. But before we could even discuss it—"

"Read: settle it with your fists," Catwoman observed dryly.

"—before we could even discuss it," Batman repeated, "he got this call to pick up Ubu at the Iceberg."

"The Iceberg!?"

"Don't ask. Sounds like Ra's and Ubu both showed up there tonight and… You can imagine the rest."

Catwoman chuckled wickedly.

"I can… Ra's and Ubu at the Iceberg… Chum in shark-infested waters. Sorry I missed it."

"Selina please, Brady could be back at any minute… We didn't dare take him back to the Chinatown base. This was the first place that came to mind."

"Yeah, um, about that… I guess I'm flattered but eh, to satisfy a cat's curiosity, how did you…"

"You've had this place for at least 3 years," Batman rattled off like he was reading a resume. "But you never 'moved in.' Some point you decided you'd never use it and rented it out to Victor Frieze. He had 6 cold suits over there and a dry ice machine. All of a sudden the sign out front changes and it's a _Cats Cosmetics_ warehouse. And the next week you announce you've got a new lair. C'mon, Kitten, not even a challenge."

"Hiss."

Grunt.

"Well that aside," Catwoman purred finally. "The problem is, I do not have chains, ankle cuffs and whatever-the-hell-else he reeled off just now. Not really what this place was set up for. I've got a bottle of Tattinger ready to chill, a DVD player, and a box of those cupcakes from Magnolia Bakery."

Batman's lip twitched despite his best effort to restrain it.

"I'll make it up to you," he whispered.

"Yes, you will," she said with a gleam. "I promise you that."

* * *

Harvey Dent returned to the Flick Theatre, the one remnant of Two-Face he had kept in his life. He liked the old building. He'd liked it so much, with those enormous comedy-tragedy masks hanging off the façade like gargoyles, that he'd bought the building outright instead of just moving in like any old hideout meant to be used once and then abandoned as soon as he'd lured Batman into a deathtrap.

Batman… That was something of a dilemma. There was a time when they were allies in the war on crime. If this happened back then, Harvey would have marched right into Police HQ, gone to the roof, lit the Batsignal, and made Batman aware of the situation without thinking twice.

But that was a long time ago, and in the years since Batman became an enemy – and even more to the point, Selina became a friend. Even if she was with Bruce now, she certainly wouldn't like Harv's pulling Batman into a situation where he'd have to deal with-

"I see you have returned, my knight in shining armor."

-Talia al Ghul.

* * *

Catwoman saw no reason to stay in a lair with Joker's old henchman Giggles, nursing/guarding a shell-shocked Ubu – a shell-shocked, creeper-vined Ubu with a maple leaf tucked in his loin cloth, as if the day could get any more ludicrous after the barbecue. Ubu, personal assistant/man-bitch to the Hairdo and scourge of all things Western, enslaved by Pammy like any two-bit henchman that rubbed her the wrong way - that's just good dinner theater. And she missed it. She'd have to remember to ask the Iceberg Crowd how it all went down, but for now, she headed home.

She parked her Jaguar, as always, in the old carriage house. She disliked driving home after a prowl, it didn't seem natural. By parking in the carriage house, she could make her way across two acres of Wayne Property on foot, maneuvering expertly through the grounds security and even taking the Elms up to the manor roof to lower herself down to the bedroom window, just like getting home when she lived in the city. She was just deciding to take the Spruce tree up instead, for a little change of pace, when she saw a blue flash where no flash should be.

She uncoiled her whip and went to investigate…

* * *

"I told you," Harvey said sternly, "Not to even _joke_ with me in those terms. I didn't _rescue_ you, I don't even like you much."

"You let me share this vast palace with you," Talia answered, gesturing around the old movie house Two-Face one used as a hideout. "Without charging me 'rent.' Those women from the diner were prepared to take a 6000 gold and diamond Piaget to allow me to share their filthy, roach-infested hovel and eat the greasy refuse of a peasant trough."

"One roach is not an infestation, Talia, although I'll admit that leftover 'sticky' you brought from the diner was fairly disgusting."

"I would prefer that you call me Tee… Harvey."

"I know; that's why I'll be calling you _Talia_. And that's why you're _not_ going to start calling me Harvey. I've heard all the stories about you, lady. You're fucked up; you get ideas about men. I told you going in if there was any of that with me-"

"Yes I know, I know, you will obtain a restraining order against me, to be enforced by the Feline slut's pet tiger if necessary."

"Eah-eh-ah," he chided, waving a finger, "And what else did I say?"

Talia sighed, then answered through clenched teeth.

"That if I ever speak of Selina Kyle disrespectfully in your hearing, you will wash my mouth out with soap and send me to bed without supper."

"Damn straight."

"Why, _Mr. Dent,_ since you so obviously share the Feline's low opinion of me, did you take me in at all?"

It was a question Talia had asked twelve times since they met, and she had yet to receive a real answer.

Even with the living arrangement in Mia's flat and eating gratis at that awful diner, Talia knew she needed income to survive. She had remembered a little sign in the rear of a department store she'd frequented in Metropolis. It advertised a "finishing school" for teenage girls each Saturday morning, for five hours, lunch provided. So Talia brought this idea to the customer service desk Bergdorf's, the best department store in Gotham, offering to edify the marriageable daughters of their customers with respect to table manners and ladylike deportment. They were not interested. She tried Barneys next and they too were not interested. She tried Bloomingdale's, Henri Bendel, Macy's, Lord & Taylor, Fortunoff's and Saks. Finally, at Vendome, they said yes. Talia had a hard time conducting herself "with ladylike deportment" at that moment, so great was her shock: They said Yes! She had persevered! She was victorious! She had a job!! Maybe not much of a job, but still…

It was then that Harvey Dent came up to her. He'd been watching, he said, since Barney's; that's where he first saw her. He'd just bought this dress shirt – which he showed her as if to verify his story – when he happened to overhear her pitch. He was curious, he said, so he'd followed her. He congratulated her on her persistence, and then looked ready to leave. Desperate to prolong the encounter, Talia remembered there was a little tearoom inside the store. She suggested that he join her for a little celebration. He looked uncomfortable. His fingers twitched as if he was fidgeting with something that wasn't there. Then, with a trapped expression, he agreed.

* * *

"Oh. My. God," Catwoman said aloud on discovering the mystery blue flash was the K-metal lasers pinning an intruder on the footpath from the tennis court.

The trees on the Wayne Manor grounds were not high enough for the kind of dramatic drop-down entrances one could make in the city, so she opted to stroll up, casually, and flick off the laser control with an expert tap of her clawtip. Then she turned her full attention on the intruder.

"Ra's, you're having what we in Gotham call a 'Really Bad Day'," she said sweetly.

* * *

The quaint tearoom in the corner of the posh Vendome department store was more refined than anything Talia had experienced in months. It was far better appointed than that horrid diner where she had been taking her meals since parting with Greg Brady, not to mention the coarse roadhouses she'd been subjected to when they were together. Talia had reveled in that half hour's taste of her old life – until the bill came and she realized, to her horror, that she had asked Harvey Dent to be her guest but had no way at all to pay for it. Her cheeks burned as she stammered an explanation: the watch, the diner, her finances, her father – going so far as to showing Harvey the credit card that she dared not use.

At that moment, Harvey Dent proved himself to be something Talia had not encountered in the modern world: he was a gentleman. He picked up the check as if it had been his intention all along. And rather than leaving it at that, he went on to address several details from her rambling explanation, details Talia was surprised he'd notice or care about. Then, with the focus and organization of a brilliant lawyer who had also been a criminal mastermind, Harvey laid out a plan to put her life in order.

They started by redeeming her watch from Mia and moving Talia into the Flick Theatre. Harvey didn't want her watch in exchange for room and board; he wanted her to do what she'd done at the department stores: to find some skill or resource she actually possessed on her own and use it to make herself useful and valuable.

Under all her bluster and pretense, Talia didn't really think she had any skills or resources. She'd been a failure at everything she'd ever attempted, from the League of Assassins to LexCorp, from seducing Bruce Wayne to making a life with Greg Brady… Of all the failures and disappointments, it was that last one that haunted her. She'd looked on Greg as nothing more than a protector, a practical expediency after the disaster with LexCorp left her with nowhere else to go. It was only after Greg had left – after _she_ so senselessly drove him away with her stupid, futile pursuit of Bruce Wayne – that she realized she'd been truly happy with him as she'd never been chasing after—

"Good god, the Water Works," Harvey Dent grumbled. "You get weepier than any woman I've ever met. And all because a guy won't let you call his best friend a vermin slut."

Talia drew herself up proudly – a move Harvey recognized from Ra's performance earlier in the day. He shook his head sadly as she announced – with less hauteur than Ra's at least – that she had thought of a quality she possessed that could be of use to him, to pay for her room and board.

"Astonish me," Harvey said with a haunting ring of Two-Face's cruel sarcasm. "What did you come up with?"

"I'm old," Talia answered simply. "This building wasn't a movie house originally. It was a theatre for the lower sorts, Vaudeville, and before that a Spanish theatre I expect. I remember them. The single women would have sat up there, that whole section that's closed off now as the projection booth, those would be the private boxes, and that refreshment area below would have been an open courtyard."

Harvey smiled at this.

"Go on," he said. "Interesting, but so far doesn't do me any good unless I'm working on a history dissertation at Hudson U."

"Don't you see," she sang out, becoming wildly enthusiastic, "You could restore it! I could help you; we could make it all exactly as it was. In Metropolis there was always some 'Historic Riverfront' restoration being proposed to revitalize some neighborhood or other, rebuilding an old location and putting in shops and restaurants."

Harvey's smile broadened, he looked truly pleased. But he shook his head no.

"I haven't got that kind of money," he said happily. "I can live indefinitely on the income from Two-Face's plunder, but I can't go investing in a pipedream like that."

"We can raise the money," Talia said quickly. "Loans, bonds, charity events, there are a thousand ways to raise capital, why at LexCorp—"

"Not that black card in your purse?" Harvey asked, amused. "You can buy a plane with that if you wanted, a city block, or a couple million in contractor's services and supplies."

"I- I _can't_," Talia stammered.

"I know you can't," Harvey laughed. "You didn't even suggest it."

Talia looked bewildered.

"Mr. Dent, I have already explained that if I were to charge so much as a dollar to that credit card, my father will—"

"Will know at once where you are and that you need him. I know. Talia, I _know_. You asked why you're here, why I agreed to help you even though, as you guessed, I can't stand you. Well that's why. Because you've got that card in your purse that'll solve all your problems – but you can't use it, 'cause it sucks you right back into your old life. So you moved on – but you've got it with you. You didn't cut it up."

He reached in his pocket and took out a silver dollar, holding it up like a talisman.

"This is mine."

Talia didn't seem to understand. She looked put out.

"You have no interest in my helping you restore this building then? You meant merely to test me?"

"I have _absolutely_ no interest," Harvey confirmed, "but now that we've found something you can do, I'm sure there's a Victorian pub or a colonial inn out there looking for a consultant. I'll ask around the Harvard Club and find you something – in Aspen or Vancouver or maybe Melbourne. Far, far from Gotham is the point. You need to get your tail out of here, and fast."

"Absolutely not," Talia declared, "What new life I make for myself shall be here in Gotham or not at all."

"Talia, No. I didn't know how to break this to you, so I'm just going to spit it out: Your father is in Gotham. I saw him this afternoon. He must be looking for you. You've got to leave."

Talia's knees felt weak and she steadied herself against the wall before lowering herself feebly into a chair.

"I cannot," she said helplessly. "I cannot leave Gotham, Mr. Dent. I simply can't."

* * *

Jonathan Crane clung fitfully to the chandelier above the Iceberg dining room.

"Oswald, we can work this out," he pleaded miserably. "It was a simple misunderstanding."

Oswald Cobblepot said nothing but watched coldly as four hatted emperor penguins circled under the chandelier like fuzzy waddling sharks.

"It was a simple misunderstanding!" Crane repeated desperately.

It was a movie, Oswald sniffed. _March of the Penguins_ – a Zoom henchwench came all the way from Keystone City to have him autograph a poster for it. _March of the Penguins_ and he hadn't heard a thing about it. _March of the Penguins_ and he'd worked himself into a state because of all the Ozzy-Wozzying he was the sudden focus of. He would be one credulous bird if he didn't recognize _that_ as a bit of Scarecrow handiwork.

"This isn't my fault!" Crane wailed feebly.

Oswald waddled regally out to the main floor, stood directly under Jonathan Crane, and prodded him higher into the chandelier with the tip of his umbrella.

"Three booths shattered by a freeze ray," Oswald said testily, "Nine Ghost Dragons claiming whiplash injuries from sliding into each other on the resulting ice slick and demanding their bar tabs be zeroed in remuneration. We shall have to close for at least two nights to get all the foliage removed from the ventilation ducts where they fled. And I personally, taking refuge behind the bar from a fear-crazed Ubu on the one side and a fear-crazed penguin on the other, stubbed my toe. Your bill comes to 58,043. I leave you now, my dear Jonathan, to find an all-night moviehouse screening this _March of the Penguins_. I expect to receive payment in full by last call tomorrow evening."

* * *

Catwoman ushered Ra's al Ghul through the French doors into the Wayne Manor dining room – only to be met by Alfred Pennyworth sternly pointing one of Ra's own Dragon Blades squarely at his chest.

"Very pleased to see you back, Miss," Alfred said calmly, nudging Ra's at swordpoint into the nearest chair. "The alarm system alerted me, of course, when the perimeter was breached. I thought it best to stand watch in case the _individual_ made it to the house." He sniffed disgustedly in Ra's direction. "As you are more than capable of seeing to the present situation, shall I consider myself at liberty to inform the master of this _new development_."

"Sure," Selina nodded, taking the sword from Alfred and pointing it, playfully, towards Ra's nose. "Tell him Kitty found a way to amuse herself afterall."

Alfred gave a soft cough and left. A seething gurgle rumbled deep in Ra's al Ghul's throat, but he said nothing.

"You're awfully quiet, Ra's," Selina observed. "Cat got your tongue?"

"If you seek to bait me, young woman, with such infantile banter, I warn you I am long past the state in which your 'catacisms' might faze me."

Catwoman laughed.

"Yes that's right, I heard. You lost your Iceberg cherry. Congratulations Ra's, _today you are a rogue_."

Ra's drew himself up, and regarded the far wall with a blank expression.

"I shall wait for the Detective's return. I shall not demean myself further by speaking with you, Woman."

Catwoman shrugged, pulled up a chair opposite him and sat prettily, crossing her legs and pointing the sword, yet again, at Ra's chest. At the conclusion of this maneuver, she affixed him with a naughty grin.

"So we wait," she said happily.

One minute and thirty seconds of Catwoman's naughty grin was as much as Ra's al Ghul could endure in silence. He coughed, as if he had to physically expel some kernel of dignity from his body before he could proceed.

"Madam," he began as if dictating a letter, "It is unlikely that a woman such as yourself can begin to fathom… That is to say, circumstances sometimes arise between men of consequence… Oh, how can I possibly put this that your feeble intellect can understand—"

"You're screwed," Selina said simply. "Ra's, I could honestly give a damn if you tell me why you're here or not, but that's the story. Coming to the house, going to the Iceberg, getting nailed by a K-metal laser outside, that's all just detail. Your ass was toast the minute you took it into your head to come to Gotham."

"You may speak truth, Feline. But I was _lured_ here, possibly to my doom, by an unscrupulous assassin! And therein lies my business with the Detective. I simply must locate my daughter if I am to survive these present circumstances, and as I am unable to locate her through the usual means I—"

The tip of the Dragon Blade bobbled merrily as Catwoman laughed.

"You're fucking kidding me, right? Not the kidnapping shit _again_. Ra's, for god sake, learn a new tune."

Ra's closed his eyes, summoning patience.

"Catwoman, I assure you, I am more than aware that my circumstances bare a… an indisputable similarity to that ruse by which I habitually appraise the abilities of potential… that is to say, I am not unaware that the credibility of my claim is not enhanced by—"

"Stop! Ra's, you were drinking with _Jervis_ tonight, weren't you? It's contagious. Trust me on this, there's no way out of that sentence."

Ra's nodded.

"You really _are_ looking for Talia?"

He nodded again.

"You figure she's somehow going to help you against this 'unscrupulous assassin' you've got chomping at your heels?"

He nodded.

"Same way you thought she'd 'help' you with Bruce?" Selina said, twirling the tip of the blade. "How's that little plan working out for you, Demon Head?"

Ra's trembled with anger. Much as his regal pride burned to strike down this insolent female, he recalled his earlier thought: If he was meant to die in the Detective's City, _it would be on point of his own Dragon Blade, even if it was that accursed Feline that drove it through his bowels. _Ra's al Ghul was no coward, but he was superstitious. If that earlier thought was prophetic, it was sent as a warning from the Fates. He would not tempt their good will. So he choked down his fury and assumed a patronizing smile.

"Women see these things so simply," he said, standing carefully and keeping a wary eye on the Dragon Blade as Catwoman stood as well. "Nevertheless, if you will kindly inform the Detective on his return that I require his assistance in locating my daughter, and that it shall certainly be in his interests to aid me, as this treacherous individual I battle is of his city. Surely the danger is as great to all of you as it is to myself, should Greg Brady come to power and—"

"Greg Brady?" Selina repeated, her face betraying no hint of emotion.

"It is by that name he is known among your people, yes."

Selina ran her tongue thoughtfully against the back edge of her teeth, while her features remained calm and impassive.

"I will certainly give him the message," she said at last.

* * *

…to be concluded…


	6. Eli's Coming

**Napoleon's Plan**  
_Chapter 6: Eli's Coming_

* * *

Batman watched silently in the doorway of the Wayne Manor dining room as Catwoman moved slowly but smoothly through the three sword-kata she knew. At the conclusion of the last one, rather than resheathing Ra's al Ghul's Dragon Blade, she planted its tip firmly and defiantly into the spot where Alfred left each day's menu next to her plate on the table.

"Hey, That's an original Robert Adam made by Chippendale," he heard himself blurt out, falling far short of the Bat-bravado than he'd intended to announce his presence.

Selina – and in a nanosecond she _had_ transformed from Catwoman into Selina – smiled up at him.

"I would have bet anything you wouldn't know Robert Adam from Calendar Man," she noted, the smile becoming naughtier but no more feline. "I'll get it fixed tomorrow – but only after Alfred sees it and pries it up. I want to make a point." At which moment she flicked the edge of the blade with her claw, and at the sound of the clink she seemed like Catwoman again.

"I take it Ra's is gone," Batman graveled. It was obvious from her behavior that he was, but asking allowed him to regain a sense of his own "Battitude."

"Oh he's gone alright," Catwoman laughed. "He's about as _gone_ as you can possibly be without thinking the voices in your head are other people. Are you ready for this one? You won't believe it, you seriously will not believe – I mean even after barbecue and swords and Iceberg and Ubu, this is just _nuts_."

"Well?"

"He wants you to find the demonspawn for him, so he can sic her on his new nemesis: Greg Brady."

"It's killing you holding back a lip twitch right now, isn't it?"

"I can turn the other way if you want to let it out without my seeing."

Before Batman could respond, there was a soft cough from the doorway. He was startled to see Alfred look past him somewhat coldly and address only Selina:

"Begging your pardon, Madam, there is _yet another_ guest to see you on a matter of, of some delicacy," he announced formally, faltering only when his eyes riveted on the table. Alfred composed himself quickly and stepped neatly to the side, to reveal Harvey Dent following behind him.

Harvey regarded Batman with as much disgruntled surprise as Batman regarded him. Alfred examined the sword sticking out of the table with considerably more disgruntlement, leaving Catwoman to end the collective stalemate.

"It's like Time Square in here tonight, isn't it. What can I do for you, Harvey?"

Harvey shot a final, suspicious glare at Batman before giving Selina his attention.

"I really didn't want to bother you with this, Hon, especially after the scene with the Hairdo this afternoon… But I see you're being 'bothered' anyway."

"Should I go?" Batman growled sarcastically.

"Yes, do," Harvey said bluntly. "Anyway Selina, the reason I came back: I thought maybe Alfred could point me to a historical society, daughters of the revolution or one of those groups that restore old houses. But he insisted I talk to you about it. I don't see why when it's to help out… well… she's not exactly your favorite person."

Harvey paused awkwardly, noting that Batman had not left.

"She?" Catwoman asked archly, "Harvey, you didn't start 'gardening' again, did you, because I really don't-"

"No, it's nothing to do with Ivy. It's for Talia al Ghul that I'm asking, and before you say anything else, the answer is No! Nonononono. I _would_ start 'gardening' again before I'd get sucked into that al Ghul disaster. But she needs a job, and much as I'm trying to get her out of Gotham –for her own sake as much as yours, now that Lurch is roaming around– she simply will not budge while Greg Brady is here."

Catwoman looked happily from Harvey to Batman.

"In Billiards I think they call this a bank shot," she quipped.

* * *

Harvey had a very particular mental scale by which to gauge women's behavior, good and bad. +10 he thought of as "Pretty Petal," -10 was "REVENGE FOR IVAN, REVENGE FOR IVAN, DIE PLANT-KILLER DIE!"

The hysterics that broke out when Talia al Ghul saw she was being taken to a Cat Lair were a –6, rather like the time Clayface drew Poison Ivy's name for the Secret Santa and gave her potpourri.

"Cat Cosmetics! _Cat_ Cosmetics, Cat _Cosmetics! _How dare you, How _dare_ you, You- You- You- Miserable- Vile- Loathesome… You _guttersnipe_! You duplicitous twofaced **_FREAK_**!!"

Harvey was torn. If Two-Face was still around, he would have slugged her by now. But the phrase which tempted Harvey Dent to do the same was an expression Two-Face would have reveled in. "Duplicitous twofaced freak," indeed.

Harvey reminded himself that his half, the good half, would never strike a woman in anger; the rough stuff was entirely Two-Face's domain… _Although,_ it was certainly permissible to slap a raving hysteric, regardless of gender, especially if they were about to have a screaming fit outside a criminal hideout, attracting twenty-two kinds of unwanted attention.

He drew his hand back to threaten if not actually deliver such a blow, when the door of "Cat Cosmetics" burst open and in a single violent blur of movement and **_PAIN_**, Harvey found himself thrown backward onto the sidewalk by a – a fist-sized truck ramming into the right side of his jaw.

He massaged it, slowly, sensing a painful toothy throb underneath the flat stinging that covered his whole cheek.

Attacks that swift and vicious seldom stopped at a single punch, but when Harvey caught his breath sufficiently, he saw his assailant was too occupied with another matter to pummel him further.

"There there, baby, it's okay," Greg Brady was saying while Talia continued her hysterics (albeit of a weepier sort) into his chest.

"A-hem, Very nice," Harvey coughed as he stood. "Glad I could help."

Greg nodded. And Harvey waited for some sign that Talia was ready to resume human interaction… He waited, while unintelligible sounds, alternately livid and weepy, continued to stream into Greg Brady's shirt.

Harvey checked his watch.

He looked at Greg, who shrugged.

After two full minutes of this, Harvey decided he really had given this misadventure enough of his time. He cleared his throat and told Greg that he had a message to deliver, from Catwoman.

The name brought a more emphatic round of angry garbled sobs from Talia, but Harvey had already decided to direct his comments to the more rational party. This Greg Brady surely was kind of henchman who could trusted to follow simple instructions, so Harvey cleared his throat a _second_ time and delivered his message: Brady and Talia were both to wait at the lair until they were contacted, Harvey didn't know by whom. It might be the great Bat-pest himself, might be Robin or Batgirl or Nightwing, it might even be Catwoman… (pause for another outburst of teary ranting and raving, largely inaudible but definitely containing the words "feline" and "slut")…

"We talked about that," Harvey said sternly, shaking his finger. "'_The Feline' _also said that, since you're here, there's a box of Magnolia cupcakes, help yourself, no point in letting them go to waste."

"Cool," Greg said.

"mrfphwmplfr," Talia added.

Harvey nodded, turned, and walked alone into the fog, feeling like Bogart at the end of Casablanca.

* * *

The oblique shadow that fell across the floor of the Gotham Imperial's Honeymoon Suite was enough to announce Batman's arrival, and Ra's addressed his adversary without turning his gaze from the window.

"I have witnessed the sunrise from atop Mount Fuji, Detective, from the Temple of Karnak, and from the Valley of the Kings. But never have mine eyes beheld the coming dawn with such a sense of triumph. I have suffered the slings and arrows of 'A Really Bad Day' in Gotham, and I have survived."

"Coming into my city was your first mistake," Batman pronounced coldly. "One you can easily remedy."

"The Demon's Head does not err, Detective. Brady, like you yourself, has lived less than a single lifetime. What hope can such a man have against the timeless wisdom of Ra's al Ghul."

"The timeless wisdom that led to you crash a barbecue so you could give Selina a pair of swords," Batman remarked flatly.

Ra's said nothing for a long moment, seeming to study a ring on his right index finger. Finally he turned and met Batman's eyes seriously as he spoke.

"A man like Brady cannot out-think a man such as myself. If the Dragon Spirits permitted that my wisdom be dulled for a brief time, it was only so I might be led here, to come into Gotham and see what I have seen in this vile city of yours, to taste what I have tasted of your world, and recognize what is to come to pass… Yes, Detective, the Timeless Wisdom of the Dragon, the hand of Fate itself, brought me to Gotham City to 'crash a barbecue' so that _your Feline concubine_ would come into possession of my Dragon Blades."

Batman sighed.

"Every time you go into that Pit you come out crazier, Ra's," he hissed.

"No, Detective, what I glimpse in the Lazarus Pit is beyond mortal understanding, so it is not surprising you call it madness. In the first fevers after emerging, there _is_ madness, and I do not recall what I have seen in the void between life and death, between order and chaos, existence and oblivion… But I recall now, and what I saw, Detective, _was your woman_. And I was _brought_ to Gotham to see her face to face, that the sight of her wielding my brother's Dragon Blade would awaken that memory from the Lazarus Pit– There is cataclysm and crisis coming, Detective. There is negation beyond mortal death, and your Catwoman is at the heart of it."

* * *

Harvey sat with Catwoman on a fire escape overlooking the Cat Lair, waiting for the signal. _…Eli's Coming…_ He was nervous. He wanted to flip a coin, but he knew he couldn't. So he prattled on about a TV show. It was called SportsNight and the first time he saw it, Two-Face blasted the television with a double-barreled shotgun. Since ridding himself of Two-Face, Harvey had taken great pleasure in tracking down a DVD of the canceled series and watching it repeatedly.

"This one episode described Ra's to perfection," he told Selina. "Was called 'Napoleon's Plan' – a simple, _two_-part plan: first we show up, then we see what happens. That was his plan, against the Russian army. 'First we show up, then we see what happens.' Hard to believe he lost…"

Catwoman smiled politely, which made Harvey even more nervous. _…Eli's Coming…_ He wanted to flip a coin. He was about to break an unbreakable rule… He prattled on about the show.

"There was another episode called Eli's Coming. Eli's something bad. A darkness. 'They say it's always calmest before the storm, that's not true,' our guy says, 'I'm a serious sailor, It isn't calm before the storm, stuff happens."

…He was about to break an unbreakable rule, and once he did he would not be able to blame that decision on the coin… Of course the smart thing to do in those circumstances was to shut up. Just shut up. Don't say a word, no rules broken, no cheek made into a scratching post. Just let it go…

"I can't. Selina, I can't just sit here and ignore it all, pretend that nothing is… Damnit. You and Bruce are so right together, I can't just sit here and not ask _what_ you think you're doing getting so chummy with Batman?!"

Catwoman turned to treat such infractions as she always did – but found an unscarred Harvey was a lot harder to threaten than a mouthy Two-Face.

"It's not like that," she lied. Then, tempering the lie with a bit of truth, she added, "I've helped him before, especially against Ra's; this is nothing new. _You're_ helping too, Harvey, helping him and me and the demonspawn; doesn't mean you're carrying a torch for anybody, does it?"

Harvey considered this, and then, with the air of a skilled prosecutor, he pointed out the glaring inconsistency in the witness's statement:

"So why've you got high-rent cupcakes in your lair?"

Selina laughed.

"Gee, let me think: why if I'm not getting it on with Batman, would I have cupcakes in my lair? Um, let's see: chocolate cake/pink buttercream frosting, yellow cake/purple buttercream frosting with these delicious light blue sprinkles, coconut meringue, and red velvet. Can you say 'Meow'?"

"Is that the only reason?" he asked grimly.

Selina took off the Catwoman mask, peeled off her gloves, and took Harvey's hand in both of hers, then looked deeply into his eyes.

"Harvey, I swear to you on that coin Nutmeg stole from you mid-flip the night Jervis brought his Aunt Maud to the Iceberg, I _swear_ to you: I am not cheating on Bruce with Batman."

There was a soft buzz, and Selina extracted a small earpiece from inside the cowl and held it to her ear. She listened for a minute, then nodded.

"Show time," she said with a wink, hurriedly pulling her gloves back on. "Ra's is on his way. Thanks for helping, Harvey. You're the best… Oh, and if you ever mention Bats in that context again, I'll claw you within an inch of your life. Goodnight!"

Then she blew a kiss, and jumped from the fire escape.

* * *

By the time Ra's al Ghul reached the address he was given, the Cat Cosmetics signage had been replaced with a "Crushed Ice" marquee left from Mr. Freeze's tenure in the hideout. Greg and the still unconscious Ubu were hidden in a back room, along with a leopard print pillow, a bronze Loet Vanderveen sculpture of a stretching cheetah, a Val Saint-Lambert black crystal panther, and another Loet Vanderveen structure of hand-patinated autumn gold finish with more bronze cougars draped over it.

Catwoman had explained all these details as she helped Greg get himself situated in the back room; he listened as he might to Joker's wild ravings about Abbot, radioactive bat-guano, and Costello.

They waited…

As soon as voices were heard in the main room, Catwoman adjusted her earpiece to listen in. A slow cat-smile spread over her features. Greg, henchmanlike, waited silently, asking no questions unless and until the villain-in-charge decided to tell him what was happening.

"He says she's gotten 'plump,'" Catwoman reported, "Quite the charmer is our boy Ra's, isn't he. I mean, she _has_ put on a few pounds since I saw her last, but you don't see me saying that to her face. That's your doing, you know Giggles. The break-up binge."

Greg looked uncomfortable. It didn't pay to argue with a boss, and Catwoman was a name rogue, one of the biggest. But of all the crazy stuff he'd heard from Joker, from Penguin, from Ra's al Ghul, he really didn't like this stuff she was saying about a "Karmic Tread Mill" waiting for him and every other "Tripod" to work off all the Snickers Bars and cookie dough their girlfriends consumed because—

"Uh oh," Catwoman said sharply, her eyes widening in alarm at what she heard on the earpiece. "Oh my lord, oh my dearlord – Don't panic, Demonspawn, _just don't panic_."

* * *

"I beg your pardon, Father?" Talia asked, her eyes nearly as wide as Selina's had been at the incredible words.

"I ask if this becoming plumpness heralds a happy event? Have matters with the Detective progressed thusly that you are with child?"

The fragile, infant identity of "Tee" was battered by waves of shame and failure that always assailed Talia in her father's presence. She looked to the floor and spoke just above a whisper.

"No Sire, I beg to report that I am not with child."

Ra's sighed, as if he was used to such disappointment and really expected no better.

"It is as well," he intoned. "You must suspend your efforts with the Detective for the present and pursue another matter. Daughter, I wish you to direct all your charms, such as they are, to Gr'oriBr'di. Get close to him and learn what you can. I will not abide a coup from within. Once you have seduced him, report back to me and I shall instruct you how to proceed. It may be enough to lure him to the desert installation where- Daughter?"

* * *

Catwoman jumped as a loud crash sounded simultaneously in the outer room and in her earpiece. She looked at Brady and then past him to the sculptures.

"We might have missed one of the bronze cougars on that black one," she said, pointing to the sculpture. There was another loud crash from the outer room. "It's just a guess," she said with an apologetic shrug.

"What's going on our there?" Greg asked in a harsh whisper, cut short by another crash.

"Well my Nepali isn't that good," Catwoman said mildly. "But um, I think '_Lhotte ra morr, alachina harami' _is roughly 'Fall and die, Unholy Idiot Bastard."

* * *

"_Ullu, olchi, morre ko manchi rakches!" _Talia screamed, swinging the bronze cougar at her father's head with all the ferocity of one trained by the League of Assassins – and all the precision of one who flunked out before making fifth-tier ajax. "So you would now have your darling, loyal, loving daughter give her body to your _new_ enemy, Gr'oriBr'di! To Gr'oriBr'di!! You would have me spread my legs for Gr'oriBr'di now, would you father!! It will be a pleasure, I assure you. More so than I could hope for from some sexless, inbred boy with whose family you wanted an alliance, more so than with that Tartar chieftain or that Moldovian prince. Cold, cruel brutes that take no notice of a woman's pleasure or pain because they thought only whores are meant to enjoy the physical act."

"Daughter really," Ra's sputtered, color racing to his cheeks as the veins in his neck throbbed dangerously.

"And certainly more than I would ever expect from _your precious Detective_, Father, a man who does not want me and never wanted me. It is not edifying to offer yourself to such a one and receive only rejection after rejection, disappointment after disappointment, and be forced always to go back for more ridicule and debasement. I should have spat in your face the first time you suggested it, _Alachina more ko manchi_."

"The Detective was YOUR OWN CHOICE!" Ra's bellowed, the vivid red flushing his face deepening into an unwholesome plum.

"BECAUSE HE COULD GET ME AWAY FROM YOU!!" Talia screeched. "He stood up to you, you _derrpok alu ko tauko_! He could fight you; he could win. With him I could get away FROM YOU!!"

* * *

"—With him I could get away FROM YOU!!"

This last was shrieked at such a volume, Catwoman yanked the earpiece from her cowl and held it at arm's length. It continued to squawk audibly, in a shrill feminine voice, then a low masculine one, until finally, all went silent.

Catwoman looked at Brady and Brady looked at Catwoman.

"I have to go out there," he said, pleading.

"You can't. Greg, you know what Batman said. Come hell or high water, Ra's can't know you're here."

"She could be in trouble."

"She was doing fine in what I heard," Catwoman pointed out.

The silence continued.

"Please," Greg said finally.

"Okay, I'll go," Catwoman answered – but before she could move, there was a timid knock at the door. Catwoman glanced again at Greg. He assumed a "Hey I'm just a dumb henchman" expression. She motioned him to the door, unfurled her whip, and then nodded. Greg opened the door swiftly, and Talia stood, calm and alone.

"Feline," She said snidely, "if you have some sort of telephone around this hovel of yours, my father appears to have had a fit of some kind. He may be in need of medical attention."

* * *

Nothing about Batman and Catwoman was "normal." They weren't normal as criminal and crimefighter, they weren't normal as lovers, and if there was a norm for criminals and crimefighters who then became lovers…

The thought was the same as the first time Batman clenched his knuckles into a fist and rapped them against the door of the Cat Lair, but the circumstances were – thankfully – much different. He heard the high-pitched metallic whine of the overhead camera swinging into position, and he hastily opened a small white bakery box to display its contents to the searching camera lens.

He heard a merry laugh inside and the door quickly opened.

"You are quite wonderfully strange," she told him, dipping a delicate clawtip into the box and extracting the minutest taste of frosting… which she then licked with feline precision… Batman felt a sharp spasm ripple through his body when that tongue of hers made contact with the claw. He stood there stunned with only the sound of his pounding heart thumping in his ears. Somewhere in the distance an amused voice said, "Get in here, Jackass."

He managed to remain "Batman" for about 12 more steps, until he reached the main room of the lair and saw the ice bucket back in its place on the table, a bottle of champagne chilling inside it, and the formerly Ubu'd sofa reupholstered.

By the time he set the box of cupcakes on the table, the transformation was complete. It was Bruce-in-a-batsuit who shrugged his cape out of the way as he sat on the sofa. And it was Bruce-in-a-batsuit that was suddenly pounced on, without benefit of Batman's reflexes to defend himself.

"You're in quite a state," he observed when they came up for air.

"I am," she sighed. "This whole thing has been so nuts, and I've been so worked up since… Ra's, Spawn, then more Ra's and more Spawn…" she paused and looked at him searchingly. "…No chance to really talk to you in the interim—" and there she broke off to subject him to another full minute of passionate, probing tongue-wrestling. Reluctantly, Bruce pulled her head back from his and touched her cheek at the base of the mask.

"Let's lose these," he said.

She obligingly removed her cowl, and then ran a finger down the nose of his. He took off the mask… and ignored, for the moment, a nagging pang.

"So what happened with Ra's?" Selina asked, peering into the bakery box and scrutinizing the cupcakes like a jewelcase at Tiffany's.

"It was a stroke," Batman answered. "Wouldn't think that was possible fresh out of the pit, but… well, magic is unreliable. Even he doesn't know what a Lazarus Pit actually is or what it physically does and—"

"And whatever it does," Selina smiled, licking the edge of the frosting slowly like an ice cream cone, "It can't take the shock of a spawn-flogging, particularly after a Harvey-spanking, a wild night at the Iceberg, Ubu separation, K-metal lasers and an Alfred encounter."

Bruce shook his head, a genuine laugh pushing through the remnants of Bat-reserve, and he opened the champagne.

"He'll be fine, unfortunately, once he can manage a redip. But between the good doctors at Gotham General, the hospital bureaucracy, the FBI, Homeland Security, INS, MI6, and InterPol all lining up against him, he might have been tangled in the system until he simply ran out of time."

"_Might_ have?" Selina asked curiously.

He grunted.

"You didn't. You wouldn't – You – You pulled strings to get the Cadaver sent home?"

"I wanted him out of the country. He wanted it even more, which is the ideal negotiating position. So I got him out, on one condition: that he NEVER comes back to Gotham again."

"Will that work? Just getting him to agree?"

"Of course not. But Ra's is a 'knowledge is power' kind of guy, and this will make him cringe for quite a while. A 'favor' dangling over his head is… well, let's just say it's worth more, from a tactical perspective, than argument, fists, or sword fights will ever be."

"And what becomes of Greg Brady and the spawn?"

"He likes motorcycles. I set him up with a Yamaha dealership out west. I assume she'll go along," Bruce said, pouring the champagne.

"Oh I like the sound of that," Selina noted.

"Not half as much as I do," Bruce enthused, handing her a glass and holding up his own.

The moment froze, and Bruce felt that nagging pang return. Like that first 'morning after' at the penthouse, he looked into her eyes and seemed to see his own thought reflected there.

"We didn't last too long," she noted, glancing at his mask lying on the table next to a clawed cat glove and a box of gourmet cupcakes.

"You mean the fling?" he asked

"All those years of build up, to have burned out so quickly," she said sadly. "I thought there was more there."

"What's burned out? Kitten, the masks off, that's an escalation not a retreat. This whole thing has been an exercise in 'What If', hasn't it: What if we had, back then, Bat and Cat?… Well, now we know." He set down his glass and caressed her unmasked cheek. "It's not enough; before long, one of us would have wanted more?"

Selina smiled and pushed him gently back on the sofa.

"It would have been me," she said, curling under his shoulder. "I'd start to wonder about your other life. One night, after we'd shaken the cobblestones loose on some rooftop, I would have asked for some tiny secret from it: right side of the bed or left, how you take your coffee… if you ever had a cat."

Bruce stroked her hair thoughtfully.

"Right side. Black no sugar… Not until now."

"Smooth," she purred. "Wait a minute, you put milk in your coffee, I saw you do it yesterday. You're going to sit on that rooftop, sweet afterglow cuddling going on, and you're going to _lie_ to me about a splash of milk in your morning coffee?"

"No," Bruce insisted, "This is a hypothetical 'back then' and _back then_ I drank it black. I've only tried the milk once in a while since you."

"Ruins the bitter for you, doesn't it?"

"Impossible woman."

"Meow."

Grunt.

There was a lengthy pause, then the Batman voice returned:

"I brood less."

"What?"

"The hypothetical rooftop, if you asked about my other life, that's what I would have told you. Since you, since us… I brood less."

Selina snuggled in closer.

"I like that a lot."

"You've got an awful lot of 'Cat Stuff' around this place, you know that," Batman graveled.

Selina laughed and then dipped into Catwoman's sultriest purr as she completed the reference to that early exchange:

"Well this isn't my home, this is a lair." Then she added, "I do have a few more cat figurines, my favorites, in a curio at home… corner of the bedroom… in my real apartment."

"Maybe one day I'll see your real apartment," he whispered seductively.

"Maybe," she answered.

* * *

In the plush uptown apartment that had once been Selina Kyle's, Jason Blood awoke screaming.

Jason Blood did not scream. He had experienced literal Hell; he was not one to cry out in fright from a nightmare… Nevertheless, it was the sound of his own voice that woke him, and it wasn't exactly singing a song.

He couldn't remember the dream on waking, which was unusual.

And he felt compelled to light a candle.

He left his warm bed not bothering to don a robe. He walked to his living room, found two tea lights previously anointed with a pleasant power elixir Miriam Nash had given him. She'd received several vials, she said, from a Salem witch of ancient family. Miriam was doubtful of the woman's craft, but she said the potion's scent was delightful. Jason had detected no Magicks at all in the honey-colored liquid, but he too found the delicate amber-patchouli scent quite agreeable. Thin ripples of invisible smoke quickly rose from each tea light, distorting the appearance of the room behind it. Jason found the effect intriguing, but unsatisfying. He still needed to light a _candle_, not stubby votives like these tea lights.

He left the living room and proceeded to a back hallway… It had been Selina Kyle's exercise room when she lived in the apartment. Now it was Jason Blood's _cella vires_, a room such as all magic users have in their home, a sanctum sanctorum intertwined with their magicks, both repository of knowledge and power center. He once likened it to Batman's cave, just as the cave was a manifestation of Bruce Wayne's essence as a crimefighter, the _cella vires_ embodied all a magician was_ as a magician. _

Horns… as Jason stepped into that most private room, he remembered music from his dream, haunting music, a sound that locks in the brain repeating until it would drive you mad… mournful horns, and perhaps strings…

Jason rummaged for a candle. He found a yellow one at first, but that wasn't right. Yellow was for spells of persuasion and influence. He found a white one for cleansing and purity or to compel truth. A black one… Black for loss or discord. No, none of this was right. If only he could concentrate, that cursed music sounding in his head, brassy muted horns mourning a fragment of a forgotten tune… **_Purple_**! There it was. A purple candle, that's what he was to light.

…That smell from the tea lights, amber and patchouli, lingered on his fingers…

…and the horns faded into more lyrical woodwinds, just as mournful…

He struck a match and touched the flame to the wick; saw the flame double as the wick caught…

…horns rising hopefully now, joined again by woodwinds and strings, and…

The flame **_froze_**

And the horns JUMPED – triumphant – and Jason felt an ecstasy of recognition as that faint, teasing memory of a song blazed into focus: Siegfried's Funeral Music. That was his dream.

And the flame was on the candle was… still. Jason touched it and felt the pads of his fingers burn – it _was_ fire, it was a _flame_, but it did not move.

And the majesty of Siegfried's funeral music rose and fell away again in his mind.

In the fourteen hundred forty years Jason Blood had channeled the magicks, he had experienced rage and rapture, torture and madness, despair, anguish, hatred, and the fires of Hell itself - but he had never been _afraid _as he was now.

Siegfried's Funeral Music, from _Gotterdamerung_. The word meant "The Twilight of the Gods." The communists had played it when they erected the Berlin Wall to signal the end of the old world order. The symbolism would have been lost on any other people, but in Germany they grew up with that opera and the myths on which it was based. They all understood what that melody meant: the gods were finished; the end of everything had come.

The purple candle continued to burn with a flame that did not move.

And Jason Blood was very much afraid.

* * *

© Chris Dee, 2005

-- — -- — -- -- — -- — --  
War on Thanagar? Villains United under Lex Luthor?  
Rannians? OMACs? Max Lord?  
That's not an Infinite Crisis.  
_This_ is an _Infinite Crisis… _

**STRING THEORY**  
next time in Cat-Tales  
-- — -- — -- -- — -- — --


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